frank lloyd wright - first impressions.pdf
TRANSCRIPT
FRANK LlDy I]
was one of the most innovative architects of
the twentieth century. Bom in the midwest of
America, he had roots that went deep into the
prairie soil. But his instincts and energy were
dedicated to inventing new forms for building
houses and workplaces, churches, hotels, and
museums. He was also a gifted and influential
teacher, setting up two unique schools in
Wisconsin and Arizona, where he offered stu-
dent architects a chance to learn directly from
him and to work on projects under the master's
supervision.
Author Susan Goldman Rubin tells Wright's
story from his happy, creative boyhood onward:
to a fruitful apprenticeship in Chicago with
Louis Sullivan, one of the great midwestern
tum-of-the-century architects, through his own
long practice—which included designing such
landmark buildings as the Imperial Hotel in
Tokyo, the Johnson Wax Company headquar-
ters in Wisconsin, the stunning modern resi-
dence, Fallingwater, in Permsylvania , and the
crowning achievement of his late years, the
Guggenheim Museum in New York City.
Blessed with high energy and good health,
Frank Lloyd Wright lived a long, productive
life; in his eighties, when most men are enjoying
a quiet retirement, he was designing a sky-
scraper building one mile high. This is the
world of art, where anything is possible.
60 illustrations, 33 m full color
t
First Impressions
WITHDRAWN
J
First Impressions
If
P'. ap
Su^icin Goldinan ilubin
4^2;;:-^
'^
^^
^^^^^Sr^n
^sri
For my son, Andrew, and my brother, Edwin P.
Moldof, and to the memory of Helen Hinckley Jones
This book was supported by a grant from the
National Endowment for the Humanities.
Series Editor: Robert Morton
Editor: Ellen Rosefsky
Designer: Joan Lockhart
Photo Rfslarch: Jennifer Bright
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Rubin, Susan Goldman.
Frank Lloyd Wright / Susan Goldman Rubin
p cm.—(First Impressions)
Includes index.
ISBN 0-8109-3974-61 . Wright, Frank Lloyd, 1867-1 959—^Juvenile literature.
2 Architects—United States—Biography—Juvenile literature.
[ 1. Wright, Frank Llo%d, 1867-1959. 2. Architects ] I. Wright.
Frank Lloyd, 1867-1959. II. Title III. Series First impressions
(New York, N.Y.)
NA737.W7R83 1994720'.92—-dc20
IB] 93-48523
Text copyright © 1 994 Susan Goldman Rubin
Illustrations copyright © 1994 Harry N. Abrams. Inc.
Published in 1994 by Harry N Abrams, Incorporated, New York
A Times Mirror CompanyAll rights reserved. No part of the contents of this book may be
reproduced without the written permission of the publisher
Printed and bound in Hong Kong
%!
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
16
i flRCRiraRl ..y
Chapter Four
A Mm[ llous[ 44
Chapter Five
ll [1[
\
When Frank Lloyd Wright was eighty-nine, he designed a
skyscraper one mile high. Although it was never actually built, it is just
one example of his genius. Frank Lloyd Wright was a great American
architect ahead of his time.
Wright conceived Mile High in a dream and woke up m the middle of
11
D - <
the night and made a quick sketch. Later that morning he went into his
drafting room and drew a view of the building from the side (an elevation)
and a small ground plan. Over the next few weeks, he redrew his concep-
tion of Mile High on a roll of canvas tw^enty-six feet long. He rendered it
(adding tones of color) and then unveiled it for the press in a Chicago hotel
ballroom on Frank Llovd Wright Dav, September i"],
1956. Wright stood the painting against the wall.
The blue skv in the backaround matched the color of
the ballroom. As people stepped in, thev felt as though
thev were seeing Mile High on the Chicago skyline.
Mile High was onlv one of manv ideas Wright
dreamed up. His imagination grew wilder as he grew
older. Shortly before his death in 1959 when he was
working on the Guggenheim Museum, he said, "A man
slows down with age. It s inevitable. W right was
talking about other men. of course. "But I find it no
drawback, he said. "I can do double, no. ten times the
work I once could. Now I just shake the answer out of
my sleeve. Everv building is an experiment, but in the
(Previous page t Fr.\NK. LlOYD Wright stands
BESIDE A MODEL OF THE P RICE Tower at
THE EXHIBITION "SiXTY Y EARS OF Living
H Architect ire" i> 1953 . Behind him
B IS A PHOTOGRAPH OF THE ARCHED
e.ntra.nce to the V. C. Morris Shop
^^^^_ I.N San Franci.SCO.
(Left) Wright's creativity was amazing.
In three ho IRS one morning he designed
the Mile High skyscraper, the Greek
Orthodox Church, and the Beth
Sholom Synagogie.
8
The ^ ard Vt . Willits Hoise biilt in 1902 in Highland Park,
Illinois, was Wright's first great Prairie House. Notice how
the entrance is placed to the side.
same direction."
His sister Maginel, also an artist, asked him, "How do you do it? How do you
think of it all?"
Wright answered, "I can't get it out fast enough."
During a career that lasted three quarters of a century, Wright continued to
change and grow. Although he began practicing architecture in the late nine-
teenth century, his work still looks modern today. He thought about the place
where a house would be built. Architects call this siting. Wright was unique in
his love of the land in America. He used his imagination to create abstract archr
The living room at Wright"? home.
T A L I E * I N . Wisconsin, combines open
AIRY SPACE WITH COZY NOOKS FOR
READING AND PRMATE CHATS. LiGHT
POIRS IN THROUGH HIGH CLERESTORY
WINDOWS AND LOW WINDOW BANDS.
tectural forms that echoed the natural shapes and rhythms of everv setting he
worked with. His genius was marrving each house or building to its environment.
"The character of the site, he said, "is the beginning of the building. The good
building makes the landscape more beautiful than it was before that building
was built."
Wright's earlv "Prairie Houses, low and horizontal, suited the rolling mid-
westem landscape. His verti-
cal cement block houses in
southern California were
dramatic extensions of the
rugaed hillside and took
advantage of spectacular
views. In his seventies, at
an age when manv people
retire Wright developed a
different wav of designmg
and explored curves and spi-
rals. During this period he
turned out some of his great-
est masterpieces, such as
Fallingwater. a house built
over a waterfall, and the
Johnson W ax Administration
Building, a work space that looked like a Hollywood set for a science-fiction
movie.
Fallingwater superblv harmonizes with its unusual wooded setting in every
season of the vear. It embodies the essence of shelter at its most artful: a cave,
fixed in the rock, opens out to a lovelv pavilion or building above the water. It
lO
has been called "a poet's dream" as well as "the realized dream of an engineer."
The Johnson Wax Administration Building demonstrates Wright's new inter-
est in curves as a way of expressing something streamlined and inspirational in the
workplace. Curved-glass tubing forms .walls and domes. Light shimmers through
the tubes. Lily pad or mushroom columns seem to float in the main workroom.
Wright said of the building, "feel
the freedom of spaa."
One of Wright's most impor-
tant contributions was to estab-
lish a new architecture appropri-
ate to the American landscape and
informal way of life. Rather than
imitating and transplanting
European styles the way most
architects did and continue to do,
he imagined new forms. He
destroyed the usual boxlike
arrangement of rooms and opened
up interior space. The exteriors of
his building reflected his floor plans. Structure and ornament became integral
parts of his designs. W^right based his designs on principles he called organic
architecture. Nature inspired him; he wanted his houses to function as perfectly
as a snail's shell. "Form and function are one, " he once said.
To create a harmonious whole, Wright designed everything in the house or
office building himself. He introduced many of the features we take for granted
today such as built-in furniture, indirect lighting, split-levels (rooms slightly
above or below adjoining rooms), and carports. He used natural materials— brick,
stone, and wood— in their natural state, without paint, so they remained in
a glass tunnel or bridge
connects the original
Johnson Wax Administration
Blilding with the research
tower complex.
11
their true form.
An attribute of his genius was that he thought in three dimensions; he envi-
sioned a structure before drawing a sketch or elevation. Preliminarv planning
went on in his head, as it did when he designed the skyscraper Mile High. His
son John, also an architect, remembered how his father planned Midway
Gardens, an entertainment center for Chicago, in 1913:
I could not start mv work until Dad determined the design. When a week
rolled bv I became worried, thinking that probablv he was neglecting his work,
but Dad said he was thinking it out and would have it shortlv. And he did! One
ma
12
morning he walked into the drafting room, up to my board, and rolled a clean
sheet of white tracing paper on it.
"Here it is, John"
"Where is it''" I looked at the blank. paper, puzzled.
"Watch it come out of this clean white sheet." Dad began to draw. The pencil
In Midway Gardens, created in 1914, Wright demonstrated
ALL OK III.S designing SKILLS. FOH THIS I N DOOR/O L T D (M) K DINING,
DANCING, AND ENTERTAINMENT CENTER, HE CREATED THE FURNITURE,
TABLEWARE, TEXTILES, .MURALS, AND SCULPTURES.
i'^^r- -^
13
in his swift, sure hand moved rapidly, firmly, up, down, right, left, slantwise
—
mostly right and left. Withm an hour, there it was! The exact dimensions,
details, and ornamentation indicated by an interlocking organism of plans, eleva-
tions, sections, and small perspective sketches were all on the one sheet! The
entire conception as to the design w^hich was to cover a block square was com-
pleted. He drew balloons tied to the towers like the ones we played with at
home. "There it is," he said. "Now get into it. Get it out." He laid down his pen-
cil, picked up his stick, gave it a twirl, and sashayed out of the door.
Over the years Wright designed about one thousand structures, nearly half of
which were actuallv built—an extraordinarv record for a single architect. When
asked which building was his greatest, he answered, "The next one . . . always
the next one."
Not only was W^right a great architect but he was also a superb draftsman.
Throughout his life he loved to draw. His wide range of interests included
designing furniture, textiles, and decorative art glass, inventing (the wall-hung
toilet remained one of his proudest accomplishments), playing the piano, writing,
lecturing, farming, and collecting Japanese prints.
Yet above all, architecture mattered most to him. "It is basic," Wright said,
"because we live with it." Architecture is an art form that people use. In design-
ing a house an architect responds to what people need. How many will live in the
house? What activities will go on there? How should the rooms be arranged? If a
house is well designed, the people should live in it comfortably and feel protect-
ed, the way the architect intended. W^hen an architect does an outstanding job
of designing, the house also offers aesthetic pleasure— it is beautiful. In Frank
Lloyd Wright's hands architecture became sculpture, molded into a work of art.
Once a fourteen-year-old boy wrote to Wright and asked him if he would
please explain what an architect did. Wright answered:
Dear Mr. Philip,
My definition of Architect:
arclt = chief or highest (i.e., archbishop, archetype = Master)
-|- t£ct = technicjue, technology (i.e., the Know-How)
= Architect: MasUr of the Know-How'.
Sincerely,
Frank Lloyd Wright
Wright has been called the father of modern architecture. Architects of the
international style, such as Walter Gropius, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, and
Philip Johnson, who made sleek boxlike structures of steel and glass, acknowl-
edged Wright's importance and his influence on their work.
In 1949, Philip Johnson wrote, In my opinion, Frank Lloyd Wright is the
greatest living architect, and for many reasons. He is the founder of modern archi-
tecture as we know it in the West, the originator of so many styles that his emu-
lators are invariably a decade or so behind. . . . There can be no disagreement . . .
that he is the most influential architect of our century."
Critics have labeled W^right arrogant, vain, egotistical, eccentric, outspoken,
stubborn, and contradictory. He believed he was the greatest architect of all time.
One day while he was working at his drafting table, one of his apprentices over-
heard him muttering to himself, "I am a genius. " Indeed, Wright was a rebel and
a nonconformist all his life and was proud of it. He wore his hair long, carried a
cane, and designed his own unusual suits and capes. His personal and professional
life gained him notoriety as well as fame.
But the very traits that he was criticized for may have enabled him to contin-
ue working in the face of setbacks and sorrows that would have destroyed a less
confident person. Scholars continue to analyze Wright's work. New books and
articles about him are published every year. Museums throughout the world
exhibit his art. Why all this fuss about someone who died so long ago? Why is
Wright great?
15
N
Before Frank Lloyd Wright was bom, his mother, Anna
Llovd Jones, decided he would be an architect. Even while she was preg-
nant, she hung engravings of English cathedrals m her future child's room
to influence him right from the start. She was convinced her babv would
be a boy and that he would build beautiful buildings.
AD
"I was bom an architect," Wright boasted.
On June 8, i86~, he was born m Richland Center in southern Wiscon-
sin. For vears controversv surrounded his birth date. As an adult, Wright
maintained he was born in 1869. He liked creating myths about himself,
and when he wrote his autobiographv, he altered many details of his life.
IP TTPL) Lu
16
17
(Previous page) ThE EXTERIOR OF
THE John Storer Hoise in
Hollywood, California.
lAboie) Frank Lloyd Wright
TOOK THIS PICTURE OF THE WOMEN
WHO STRONGLY INFLIENCED HIS
CAREER: TO THE LEFT. HIS
MOTHER. Anna Lloyd Jones,
and her two sisters— alnt
Nell in the chair and Alnt
Jane seated on the groind.
His mother, Anna Lloyd Jones,
descended from Welsh pioneers who
settled in a vallev bv the Wisconsin
River because it reminded them of
south Wales. Thev lovinglv called
their new home "The Vallev." Four
of Anna's brothers took up farming
there, and she and her sisters taught
school. Wright adored his aunts and
uncles and wanted to look like
them— tall, dark, and handsome.
Instead he resembled his father,
William Russel Carv W^right, who
w^as short and had delicate features.
W^illiam W^right grew up in New
England and in his vouth attended
college, which was imusual at thec>
time. Multitalented, he studied law
and medicine, then became superin-
tendent of schools in Wisconsin, and
later became a minister, but his real
love was music. He earned a living
bv traveling around the country giv-
ing music lessons and mav have met
Anna at a songfest or through their
work in education. They were married on August \~], 1866, but were unhappy
almost from the start.
The familv moved often as William tried one job and then another in his search
18
for success and self-fulfillment These frecjuent moves and the ensuing tension
between his parents may have driven Wright to yearn for a perfect, permanent
home— a warm, sheltering place offerin t^ the peace he didn't experience as
a child
When Wright was two, his sister, M,iryjane, nicknamed Jennie, was born.
His other sister, Margaret Ellen, known as Maginel, was born a few years later
in Weymouth, Massachusetts. Wright attended private school in Weymouth bur
his real learning took place at home.
Anna bought an educational toy called'
Froebel Gifts for art building" for her
son that proved to be one of the great-
est influences on his approach to archi- William Rissel Gary
tecture. It was created bv a GermanJ
Wright passionately loved
educator named Friedrich Froebel, who Ml SIC AND TAl GHT HIS SON,
invented the concept of the kinder- Frank, h « \i to f' l
a
\ t h e
garten. Froebel believed young children PIANO AND HOW TO COMPOSE.
could learn with their imaginationsEiSV^SS'*^
through guided play. The Gifts consist- B ^^. jsf^ ^^m^^^B
ed of twenty sets, beginning with yarn
balls of wool and wooden blocks, trian- ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ I^^^^^^^^^bS ^Va
gles, and cylinders. Children received ^^B^«r ione set at a time with instructions and ^^^^H^^^^^^^^^^K- i^^^^^^^^^^H
built structures on a grid. The rules
helped children see geometric forms in ?^^^^^M^H^nature and understand the principles of ^^^^^^^Hgood design.
Every night after supper Wright and
his sister Jennie would sit at a low
mahogany table with their mother and
'9
plav with the Froebel tovs for hours. When Wright was in his seventies.
he clearlv remembered this pleasure. "Eventuallv I was to construct designs in
other mediums, he said, "but the smooth cardboard triangles and maplewood
blocks were most important. All are in mv fingers to this dav. . . . Design was
recreation!
"
Wright also loved to draw with colored pencils and cravons. At one point his
mother scraped enough monev together for oil painting lessons because she
These Froebel blocks and other "giets" are like the
ONES Wright played with as a child. Notice the similarity
between the wooden blocks and the cement blocks
Wright used to build the Storer House.
20
sm^m^
5r
thought It would help him
become an architect. What real-
ly helped him, though, was his
mother's teaching a la Froebel.
On long walks together they
picked wildflowers and leaves,
and Anna pointed out their geo-
metric designs and intricate pat-
terns and colors.
From his father Wright
received a different kind of train-
ing. He learned how to design
through music. William taught
his son "to see a great symphony
as an edif\cc o[ sound ." Both a sym-
phony and a house needed struc-
ture or form; their parts had to be arranged in a certain order. Both required math-
ematics. Wright began to "listen to music as a kind of building. " He realized that
architecture and music involved the same creative process of going from the
general to the particular theme and variations. To create harmony in a house, he
related the parts to the whole, just as in a symphony the movements relate to the
main theme.
Wright developed a lifelong love of music from his father. When he was an
adult he always hummed at the drafting table and listened to recordings of music
by Bach and Beethoven while he worked. Every house he lived in had a piano.
Wright admired his talented father and shared his pleasure in solo activities.
He preferred reading, drawing, and listening to music over playing with other
boys. Above all, Wright liked to daydream. His mother worried that he was
Wright saved this paper
weaving exercise from his own
SET OF Froebel's Gifts. The
COLORS AND DESIGN INSPIRED HIS
APPROACH TO HIS ADLLT WORK.
21
Frank Lloyd Wright at
the age of eight or nine,
spending too much time alone. In iS^S
the family moved back to Spring Green,
Wisconsin, when Wright was around
eleven, and Anna sent him to work on his
Lncle James s farm in The Vallev. The
experience affected him deeplv and
shaped him as an artist.
At first Wright hated the farm. Most
of all, he hated his chores. His worst job
was taking care of the cows. He fed them,
milked them, took them out to pasture,
and brought them home again. His dav
began at 4:00 A.M. and then at night,
after supper, Wright would fall into bed.
exhausted. Now he understood the mean-
ing of the Llovd Jones familv motto: "Add
tired to tired and add it again—and
add It vet again."
A few times \\ right ran awav but his uncles found him and brought him back.
Uncle Enos said, "\\ ork is an adventure that makes strong men and finishes weak
ones,' and W right never forgot that advice. After a while he became used to
farming. His muscles developed and so did his self-confidence.
For five vears in a row, Wright spent his summers on the familv's farm. In the
winters he went to public school in Madison. Looking back he regarded this peri-
od of his life as a good influence. So good that when he was much older ando c>
formed a Fellowship for aspiring architects, he insisted his apprentices spend a
few hours each dav working on a farm. The experience, he thought, would teach
them what real effort and achievement were all about.
22
Wright pii()T(k;k aphkd this
wildfi.ovl kr am) i' r i n t e d the
image himself on handmade
Japanese paper. He had a
darkroom off the balcony of
HIS Oak Park stidio.
While voung Wright toughed out his farm days, he discovered the wonder
and beauty o\ nature On Sundays he gathered pine boughs and vvildflowers to
decorate the pulpit in the family chapel Colors on the Wisconsin farm thrilled
him "Night shadows so wonderfully blue, white birches gleaming,' the tall red
lilies growing in the meadow-grass. Later when he became an architect, he
remembered the lily and transformed it into a red scjuare for his signature crest.
Wright even loved weeds, and
as a young architect he would
gather them on the prairie and
arrange them in copper urns and
vases he had designed himself. He
photographed them and printed
some of the pictures in a book
called Tilt- House Beaut I (u I. To deco-
rate the book he drew pen-and-ink
weed borders.
As a boy on the farm, W^right
observed everything around him.
"Everything has its plan," he
would say. He saw that the shapes
of natural things, like trees and
flowers, were determined by their
function Parts related harmo-
niously to the whole. The petals
of a flower, the branches of a tree
were "natural to that thing." The
trees were like different kinds of
buildings.
23
Similarlv. \\ right wanted the shapes of all of his buildings to be determined
bv the purposes thev served. Form and function are one. he said. He was begin-
ning to formulate his principles of organic architecture. Nature was so important
to him. he spelled the word with a capital N in his writings as an adult.
Living creatures also interested W right. He studied their "fascinating struc
ture. color pattern, strange movements. . . . These observations staved with him
and gave him ideas for work he was to construct later.
Twentv vears later, in 1902. when Wright designed the Dana House in
Springfield. Illinois, he created a
butterflv motif for art glass win-
dows and chandeliers. The patterns
are characteristicallv geometric. \et
the motif in the entrvwav transom
suggests the fluttering motion of real
butterflies. The art glass connects
the indoors with the outdoors. This
is what Wright meant bv organic
architecture. He learned much more
from nature than from school and
said he remembered verv little about
his formal education. A blank, he
wrote, "except for colorful experi-
ences that had nothing specific
about them Like dipping the gold
braid hanging down the back of the
prettv girl sitting in front, into the
inkwell of mv school desk and draw-
ing with It.
Wright DREW THI ? INTRICATE
BORDER F R E E H .\ > D . BASING HIS
DESIGN 0> PLANT FORMS. The
BORDERS FRAMED TEXT WRITTEN
BY HIS FRIEND ^ ILLIAM C.
Ga>>et for The Hoise
Be A I TIFl L.
M
Wright's client, Susan Lawrence Dana, wanted
THE BITTERFLY AS A MOTIF FOR HER HOISE. WrIGHT OBLIGED
WITH THIS MAGNIFICENT ART GLASS TRANSOM
FOR THE ARCHED ENTRYWAY.
For Wright the most memorable thing that happened when he was twelve
years old was meeting a crippled boy named Robie Lamp. They lived at the same
end of town. One day Wright saw some bullies trying to bury Robie in a pile of
autumn leaves. Wright, strong after his summer's work at the farm, rescued Robie
and they became best friends.
The boys spent hours together drawing, printing cards on their secondhand
press, and making kites and sleds. They both liked to invent things. Once they
started to build a pedal-driven water boat called the "Frankenrob. " They also
loved to read.
25
Some of Wright's favorite books were John Ruskin's The Seven Lamp o[
Architecturt' (1849), a gift from his aunts, and the storv of Aladdin in The Arahian
Nights, which captured his imagination. He thought of himself as a kind of
Aladdin with magical powers. Wright's heroes were Henry David Thoreau,
Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Walt Whitman. From them he inherited a nine-
teenth-century view celebrating space, nature, and the individual. W^right
embraced the message in Emerson's essay, "Self-Reliance": "There is a time in
every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envv is ignorance;
that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his
portion. . . . Trust thyself. ..."
W^right did trust himself, and he learned from his own experiences.
One day, during his high school years, as he was walking past the state capi-
tol in Madison, he heard a roar and saw the new wing collapse in a cloud of lime
dust. Some people were trapped mside. Others ran out bleeding and fell on the
front lawn. The fire department arrived quickly and kept spectators back, but
W^right stayed for hours, "too heart-sick to go away."
W^hen W^right finally went home that night, he dreamt about the tragedv and
couldn't get it out of his mind. Later he learned that the interior columns had col-
lapsed because they were rotted at the core. The architect had made them unusu-
ally large and the contractor had filled them with rubble—broken bricks and
stones—to keep expenses down. Still, the architect was held responsible for the
tragedy and never built another building. Wright learned a valuable lesson about
the importance of safe construction. When he began doing his own building in
later years, he always used first-rate materials and looked after every detail.
Around the time of the accident, his parents marriage ended in divorce. In
April 1885, when Wright was seventeen, his father left. Wright sided with his
mother, and he and his sisters staved with her. Thev suffered terriblv. Wright's
own broken home may have driven him to create beautiful homes for other
26
American families.
In those davs very few people divorced. Those who did were considered a dis-
grace. And if a minister got divorced, something was really wrong. Now there
was a stigma on the Wrights, and neighbors in Madison didn't want their chil-
dren to associate with them. Even Robie Lamp s parents didn t welcome Wright
in their house anymore. In spite of that, Wright and Robie remained friends for
life and both went to study at the University of Wisconsin.
Wright entered as a special student in engineering when he was eighteen.
There are no records to show that he ever graduated from high school. He seems
to have dropped out around the time his parents split up.
Other young people his age who wanted to become architects usually went to
architecture school, such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and
enrolled in a four-vear program. Some went on to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts
(School of Fine Arts), Pans, to complete their training, but Wright couldn't
afford this expensive education. He learned by doing. His mother helped arrange
for him to work part time for Allan D. Conover, a professor of civil engineering
at the university and a local builder.
As usual Wright didn t think much of school. Summing up the experience, he
said, "Never learned anything. . . . About the only thing I gained from my uni-
versity years was a corn from wearing toothpick shoes." Wright's shoes had
extremely pointed toes and were all the rage for college boys at the time. Wright
was a natty dresser and managed to look dapper even on a budget. Looking smart
and dressing impeccably was to be a lifelong passion.
The most important part of his brief university training was his apprenticeship
with Conover, who supervised the execution of buildings designed by others.
Some of these buildings were on the universitys campus, such as a new
Science Hall.
One cold winter night, Wright went over to inspect progress at the new
27
Science Hall and discovered a flaw in the construction. Some plates that hold
together portions or members of the trusses, the structural frame of the roof, were
not secured. The trusses had been left hanging dangerously. Wright, concerned
with safety, climbed the wooden ladder to the top of the truss supporting the
roof. The rungs were slippery with ice but he went to the verv top and stayed
until he got the clips loose and dropped them down so thev could be bolted prop-
erly the next dav. He was beginning to feel an architect s responsibility to his
building. Now he felt readv to start designing.
When he heard that his Lncle Jenkin Llovd Jones planned to build a new-
chapel for the family m The Valley, \\ right sent him some sketches showing his
ideas for the project. However, his uncle gave the job to Joseph Lyman Silsbee, a
Chicago architect. \\ right was allowed to work on the interior design and it is
said he patterned the ceiling in squares. He was also given the opportunity to
publish a rendering of the chapel m the January 188"] issue of the Annual of All
Souls Unitarian Church, Silsbee s other project for Jenkin. It was his first pub-
lished architectural drawing.
Inasmuch as Wright had a taste of real experience, he wanted more. Today's
architecture students study for four or five years and then work as apprentices for
three more years before becoming; eligible to take their license exams. But Wright
felt ready to begin work after only two semesters at the university. Besides, he
hated to see his mother and sisters making such sacrifices in order to send him to
school.
When he told his mother he wanted to drop out and go to Chicago so he could
"begin to be an architect right awav,' she was horrified. How could he think
of leaving the university before the semester was over, much less before he
graduated and earned his degree?
Wright pleaded his case: "There are great architects in Chicago, Mother, so
there must be great buildings too. I am going to be an architect, ^ou want me to
28
be one. I am nowhere near it here." He threatened to go without her approval.
Finally he persuaded his mother to write a letter to her brother, Jenkin, who
was building a church for his congregation in Chicago. Maybe he could help
Wrio;ht find work
Anna sent the letter. Jenkin's
answer read: "On no account let
the young man come to Chicago.
He should stay in Madison and
finish his education. ... If he
came here he would only waste
himself on fine clothes and girls.
But Wright immediately sold a
few things, secretly bought a train
ticket to Chicago, and kept the
change for food and a hotel. On a
February afternoon in 1887 when
he was nineteen years old,
Wright hopped on the North-
western train bound for Chicago.
A couple of friends went with
him. One was a young farmhand,
the other a student at his aunts'
Hillside Home School back in
Spring Green. The student conve-
niently happened to be the son of
Wright was about
nineteen when this picture
WAS TAKEN. HE WROTE THE
CAPTION: "The rebellious
STUDENT SHORTLY AFTER
ARRIVING IN Chicago."
a Chicago millionaire.
W^right had learned two valuable lessons from the university: the importance
of safe construction and of hard work.
29
\
30
J'
N LI
Young Mr. Wright, on his own for the first time, arrived in
Chicago on a rainy night. The next day he started to look for work and
within a week was hired by Joseph Silsbee, the architect who had
designed Unity Chapel for Wright's family and All Souls Unitarian
Church for Uncle Jenkin.
D
On his first day in the office, Wright struck up a friendship with anoth-
er young draftsman, Cecil Corwin. The two discovered they had much in
common—both were sons of ministers and loved music as well as archi-
tecture. Cecil treated Wright to lunch and invited him to stay at his
house. That night Wright borrowed $10 from him to send to his mother
1
J
31
(Previous page) ThE HILLSIDE HOME
School was Wright's first
BUILDING. His clients WERE his
AUNTS Nell and Jane, who founded
THE COEDUCATIONAL BOARDING
SCHOOL. In later years, Wright
ADOPTED THEIR EDUCATIONAL CREDO
OF LEARNING BY DOING.
(Left) Catherine Tobin Wright is
WEARING A DRESS DESIGNED BY HER
HUSBAND, Frank Lloyd Wright. He
PROBABLY TOOK THE PICTURE, TOO.
IHMHIIHHHi^
and promised to pay it back. Borrowing money and getting into debt proved to
be one of Wright's bad habits for life.
During the following months, Wright enjoyed working for Silsbee and learned
much from him. Silsbee was a popular architect of the American Shingle Style.
Shingle Style houses were characteristically asymmetrical. Viewed from the
front, the two sides were not the same. This lack of symmetry created an infor-
mal, picturesque effect. The houses were an elaborate combination of oversized
triangular gable roofs, big porches, protruding balconies, bay windows, and tall
chimneys. Wood shingles covered every exterior surface and unified the design.
In Silsbee's office, W^right and the other draftsmen developed floor plans
from the architect's freehand sketches. Then Silsbee corrected the working draw-
ings. Silsbee recognized Wright's talent and let him take on extra jobs to gain
recognition.
One freelance project was a school building in Wisconsin for his aunts Nell
32
and Jane. In 1886 his aunts had established Hillside Home School on the family's
farmland. There, boys and girls farmed, cooked, sewed, played golf, and went on
nature walks in addition to studying academic subjects. Aunt Nell asked Wright
to submit sketches for a new building and hired him as the architect. Wright's
design derived from the Shingle Style. The school building was covered with
wood shingles and had a big arched front porch and large triangular gables. This
was Wright's first commission and he was pleased with the way his career was
progressing. But his mother missed him terribly.
In those days, before the telephone was a common household item, they kept
in touch by writing. A letter of Anna's began, "My dear Frank, It is two weeks
since I wrote to you but I think of you every day." Further on she mentioned his
problem budgeting money. She knew his tendency to be extravagant. Her son was
a clotheshorse. Evidently, he had left Madison without settling a debt for cloth
dancing shoes.
Wright's mother gave him advice about his career and told him to stick with
his job. But Wright was ambitious and eager to move ahead. After three months
with Silsbee he asked for a raise and got it. However, when he asked for a second
raise and didn't get it, he quit. He quickly found another job, but the architects
there expected him to design houses. Since Wright didn t know how to yet, he
went back to Silsbee, who rehired him.
In her letters, Anna again urged Wright to stay. She also told him how to con-
duct himself with young ladies. "Don't regard girls as playthings," she wrote.
. . "I hope you will find companionship in Uncle Jenk's church."
Uncle Jenkins All Souls Church was Unitarian and offered a friendly atmo-
sphere with many social activities. Wright attended a study club there. At the
end of the class there was a costume party and everyone dressed up as characters
from Victor Hugo's Les Miscrahlcs. Wright went as a dashing French officer.
During a break for refreshments, a pretty girl in pink came rushing across the
33
dance floor and collided with him. She fell down and Wright helped her up.
Although she laughed it off and said it was her fault, he politely led her over to
her parents to apologize.
They were Mr. and Mrs. Tobin, a prosperous south-side couple. Their daugh-
ter was Catherine, nicknamed Kitty. She was sixteen and in high school. The
Tobins invited Wright to Sunday dinner the next day and that marked the begin-
ning of a friendship that blossomed into a romance.
Even though the Tobins approved, Wright's mother did not. Anna was very
possessive of her son and resented his growing attachment to Kitty. Anna had
heard about the relationship from her brother Jenkm and found out more when she
sold her house and moved to Chicago. W^right felt responsible for his mother and
sent for her and his sister Maginel. His other sister Jennie stayed m Wisconsin.
She was teaching piano and singing at Hillside Home School and moved to
Chicago later on. W^right wanted them all to live on the North Shore but Anna
worried about the strong winds off the lake and chose Oak Park instead.
Oak Park was a lovely suburb, like a village on the outskirts of Chicago. Big
trees shaded the streets. Bankers, stockbrokers, and department store owners
lived there and commuted to their dow^ntown offices. Houses w^ere built there in
the Queen Anne and Shingle styles.
Queen Anne houses were asymmetrical, too, and featured pointed roofs, corner
hexagonal towers, and wraparound porches. In general, their outside surfaces
were covered in clapboard (a long, thm wood board) and a variety of patterned
shingles. The inside walls were covered with flowery Victorian wallpaper. Dark
rooms were crammed with ornately carved furniture. Some people thought these
houses were charming. To Wright they looked silly and uncomfortable.
At first Wright and his mother and Maginel rented rooms in Oak Park. He
worked hard at Silsbee's office and learned his craft. At the same time he was
developing his own ideas about architecture and discussed them with Cecil, who
34
thought Silsbee was right in giving people the kind of houses they wanted.
Wright argued that an architect should design "the best he knew how to do. Not
as he was told to do it, but as he saw it for himself." Cecil said to Wright, "Whom
are vou going to build homes for^ But Wright wanted to be an architect who
served his clients and respected their needs and wishes, while making an artistic
statement of his own. In his search for a personal form of expression, he intu-
itively knew it was time to leave Silsbee.
Chicago architecture, at the turn of the century, was the most daring and
The extekiok of Wright's Oak Park home is shown as it looked
IN 1890, WITH Catherine standing in the doorway. The
oversized TRIANGILAR GABLE IS AN ENLARGED SIMPI.IHF.I) VERSION OF
THE ONE ON THE HILLSIDE HOME SCHOOL BLILDING.
35
forward-looking in the countrv. One of the leading firms in the citv was headed
bv two men—Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan. Adler was an engineer who
specialized in acoustics, lighting, and ventilation. Sullivan was a brilliant voung
architect. At thirtvone. Wright was on the threshold of his fame and was to
design slc\'scrapers as no one else could do, balancing their height with delicate
ornamentation.
Sullivan had been trained at MIT and at the Beaux-Arts and was alreadv a
leading figure in the movement later known as the Chicago School of
Architecture. His intricate organic patterns were inspired bv nature. Like
\\ right he believed that good designers must be "good obsen.'ers first, then good
draftsmen."
\\ right had long admired Adler and Sullivan's work, and when he heard that
thev were looking for an outstanding draftsman, he raced over for an interview.
Sullivan hired him on the merit of his drawings. Wright was twentv vears old.
His new job \vas to transtorm Sullivan s sketches for the interior of an audi-
torium he was building into working drawings to be used for construction.
Wright staved with Sullivan for nearlv seven vears. In his own words, he
became "a good pencil in the master s hand.' affectionatelv referring to his boss as
Litk-r Mti5ttr (beloved master). Wright rapidlv rose to the top of the large firm
and was given a private office adjoining Sullivan s. Soon he became head of the
Planning and Designing Department and supen-ised thirtv other draftsmen.
Naturally they were jealous of Wright and picked fights with him. According to
Wright, he secretlv took boxing lessons to prepare for a match with one of the
"Adler & Sullivan" gang. Another time he defended himself with his T square.
Wright and Sullivan formed a close friendship. Both men were great artists,
philosophers, and lovers of poetrv and music. Thev spent hours talking. Some
architectural historians sav that Sullivan learned as much from Wright as the
apprentice did from his master.
36
After Wright had worked at Adler & Sullivan for about a year, he wanted to
marry Kitty, the pretty girl he had fallen for at the costume party. Anna strong-
ly objected. She thought her son and Kitty were much too young to get married.
Eventually Anna came around and lent him money from the sale of her house in
Madison to buy a large piece of property with a house on one part of it. They
lived there while Wright designed another house on his part of the land for his
bridc'tcbe. He asked Sullivan for financial help and the firm gave him a five-year
contract and loaned him money. W^right took Sullivan to Oak Park to see the
wooded corner lot. It was on the best street in town, and it was planted with
lilacs, violets, and lilies of the valley.
Wright married Kitty on June i , 1889. She was eighteen and he was almost
twenty-two. They lived with Anna and Maginel while their own house was
under construction and moved into it just before their first baby was born the fol-
lowing spring.
According to Maginel, Wright's house was "charming and original. It was
greatly admired in the neighborhood. . . ."It has also been said that Wright mod-
eled the house upon the published designs of two shingled houses by another
architect. Certainly the house shows traits of the Shingle Style. Wright had
received good training from Silsbee and his influence appeared in W^right's work.
However, W^right was moving away from the picturesque toward simpler forms
and symmetrical designs.
Wright's house reflects his personal touch in the low sheltering roof and the
large terrace at the front connecting the house to the earth. Stone urns at the
entrance hold flowers. When the urns are viewed from above, below, or the side,
they reveal a three-dimensional representation of Wright's early logo or symbol:
a cross within a circle within a square.
Inside, the house centers around a fireplace. Inglenook seats in a cozy corner
near the hearth emphasize family togetherness. Above the inglenook seats there
37
are wood'trimmed openings that look like panels in the wall. Over the mantel a
false opening is actually a mirror. These were some of Wright's tricks to make
small spaces appear larger.
When his daughters were teenagers, they used to sit along the fireplace with
their boyfriends, one couple on each side, and hold hands. Their younger brothers
would sneak up and shoot wads of paper at them through the openings to the
library and dining room.
Wright designed his own dining room table and high-backed chairs with a
matching high chair to create a room within a room. These pieces were W^right's
first experiment in freestanding furniture and were made for him by craftsmen.
Throughout his career, W^right depended on many talented craftspeople to exe-
cute his designs. Although it was expensive to have pieces custom-made, Wright
couldn't find simple, well-constructed furniture suited to his architecture, so he
designed his own.
Over the dinmg room table, an electric light filters through a ceiling grille
carved in an abstract pattern of branches and leaves. This was probably the first
use of recessed indirect lighting. Natural light in the room comes through art
glass windows designed by Wright in a stylized lotus pattern. Art glass is like
stained glass: pieces of colored or clear glass are assembled and held together by
metal bars. The windows m the dinmg room added charm and also gave the fam-
ily privacy. The Wrights could look out while they were eating but their neigh-
bors couldn't see in.
For a few years Wright used the large front room on the second floor as a stu-
dio. Then, as his family grew, he changed and expanded the house. Change was
his guiding principle.
In 1 890, his son Lloyd was born. Then came John, Catherine, David, Frances,
and Robert Llewellyn. Wright turned the large room into a bedroom for his six
children and divided it with a low partition. Girls slept on one side, boys on the
38
Warm earth tones characterize the dining room in
Frank Llovd Wright's home. Red clay tiles cover the floor
AND hearth. The tiled fireplace is located at one end of the
ROOM, facing the ART GLASS BAY WINDOWS.
39
iother. When Catherine and Frances had slumber parties, their brothers threw
pillows across the wall.
Wright created a magnificent playroom for them. Its barrel-vaulted ceiling is
eighteen feet high. During the winter when the children had to play indoors, the
room was large enough to serve as a gymnasium. Above a huge fireplace at one end
there is a mural painted by Orlando Giannini, depicting a scene from The Arabian
Nights. At the other end
Wright's children pose
on the ver.and.a of their house. from
F.AR LEFT: Fr.\>CES, LlOYD, DaVID,
Llewellyn, Catherine, and John.
there is a gallery or raised
balcony. The children used
to put on plays for their
neighborhood friends and
charged admission for
gallery seats. A grand
piano was placed into the
wall under the gallery
steps and suspended by an
iron strap. Wright didn't
like the look of the piano,
so onlv the kevboard
shows. He organized a family orchestra and assigned each child an instrument.
Every Christmas an enormous tree stood m the center of the playroom. Lit can-
dles v^^ere attached to the branches and a bucket of water was placed nearby in
case of fire. On Christmas morning the children stood in the bedroom corridors,
waiting for their father to get up so they could go into the playroom and open
their presents.
W^right wanted them to grow up in a beautiful environment. The art glass
windows in the playroom and a carved grille covering the skylight have patterns
of stylized leaves. His daughter Catherine recalled, ".. . the ceiling was vaulted
40
with one of the most beautiful pieces of scrollwork I have ever seen." And John
remembered, "My first impression upon coming into the playroom from the nar-
row, long, low-arched, dimly lighted passageway that led to it was its great
height and brilliant light. . .
." Wright repeatedly used this device of changing
ceiling height from very low to very high to make spaces exciting and seem larg-
er than they actually were.
Young Catherine was upset that their house was so different from everyone
else's. Once she painted her wooden walls with white enamel and replaced her
simple window hangings with frilly dotted Swiss curtains so that her room
would look like her friend's across the street. But what she disliked most was the
tree in the kitchen.
The tree came to be there when Wright added a studio and connected it to the
main house with a passageway. A willow tree stood in the way, and rather than
cut It down, he allowed it to grow through the roof. People came by to see it and
called it "the house with the tree through the roof " Wright even set the icebox
between the arms of the tree. W^henever it rained there were puddles everywhere
and Catherine and her mother had to mop them up.
W^right left the job of raising the children to his wife, and he devoted himself
to his architecture. W^hen Wright first moved into his house he still worked for
Adler & Sullivan. Since they were interested in commercial projects, they turned
commissions for houses over to him. W^right designed a summer house for Sullivan
in Ocean Springs, Mississippi. At the same time, he supervised drawings for the
Schiller Building and other Chicago skyscrapers designed by Sullivan. Even so,
Wright wasn't earning enough money to pay his bills.
Wright loved beautiful things and couldn't do without them—books,
Oriental rugs, and original artwork. He wanted his handsome children to wear
"swell duds " like his, and took them downtown shopping once a year. Wright
said, "So long as we had the luxuries, the necessities could pretty well take care
41
42
of themselves." But that wasn't true.
The grocer and the butcher had to be
paid.
Secretly Wright began moonlight-
ing. He took on extra jobs after he fin-
ished his regular work in the Adler &Sullivan office. At night in his studio
he designed houses for clients who pri-
vately commissioned him Wright
called these commissions his "boot-
legged" houses. W^hen Sullivan found
out about them he was furious Wright
argued that his nighttime work didn't
interfere with his daytime performance
for the firm, but in later years he real-
ized he was wrong. After a blowup,
Wright left and didn't see Sullivan
again for twelve years.
Now Wright was truly out on his
own.
The playroom looking e.ast.
SHOWING THE BARREL VAl LT,
CARVED CEILING GRILLE ?
FIREPLACE, WINDOW SEATS, AND
BMLT-IN CLPBOARDS, WHERE THE
CHILDREN KEPT THEIR TOYS.
'•
43
In 1893, WHEN Wright was twenty-six, he opened an office
wath Cecil Corwm, the good friend he had met at Silsbee's. Now Wright
had a chance to build a more "natural" house.
Fashionable houses of the period reflected foreign stvles. Architects
combined a hodgepodge of domes, comer towers, rosette ornaments, bay
AD
windows, fancy porches, and Greek columns to suit the whims of their
clients. The richer the client, the taller and bigger the house. Interiors con-
sisted of "boxes beside or mside other boxes called rooms."
Wright wanted to build from the mside out. What kind of spaces, he
wondered, would best suit the needs of an American family? What kind
S[
44
45
of house would preser\'e family life and make it better? How could machinery and
materials be used properlv?
His first client was \\ illiam H. W'lnslow. who commissioned Wright to
design a house and stables at River Forest, a suburb west of Oak Park The sym-
metrical fagade or front of the house looks modern in its stark simplicity. The
(Previous page) WRIGHT TOOK THIS PICTl RE OF THE ROMEO AND Jl LIET
TovER ON Windmill Hill, Spring Green. Wisconsin. He described
THE design as two INTERLOCKING FORMS: ROMEO. A SLENDER DIAMOND
I SHAPE, AND JlLIET. AN OCTAGONAL SHAPE. "EaCH IS INDISPENSABLE TO
THE OTHER. NEITHER COILD STAND WITHOUT THE OTHER."*
^46ore; A PERSPECTIVE DRAWING (RENDERING) IN WATERCOLOR 0¥
THE WiNSLOw House. Wright designed the landscaping himself
AND PLANNED A MINIMUM OF PLANTS AROUND THE HOUSE TO
EMPHASIZE ITS CONNECTION WITH THE EARTH.
46
well-placed front door and the plain brick walls, devoid of fussy trim and
ornamentation, are innovations. So is the garage floor with a turntable to turn the
car around.
Wright said that the significance of the house was its sense of shelter created
by a broad overhang. The roof extends about six feet beyond the walls. 1 he main
house and stables are considered a masterpiece because of
their simplicity, originality, and graceful proportions.
Many people came to see it. Some ridiculed it. But others
loved It.
Louis Sullivan saw the house and commented to
Winslow that it demonstrated Wright's individuality.
Daniel Burnham, another well-known Chicago architect,
and Ed Waller, a wealthy neighbor of Winslow's, made
Wright a generous offer. They proposed to send him to
the Beaux-Arts in Pans for four years, all expenses paid,
if he would design classical houses upon his return.
Wright refused. The men were dumbfounded.
W^right explained that he wanted to keep his own individual ideas. In his
opinion Beaux-Arts training produced cookie-cutter architects who copied old
European styles unsuited to the American landscape and culture.
Burnham said that the success of the Worlds Columbian Exposition in
Chicago that year, 1893, indicated the great influence Classical architecture was
going to have on America. Wright thought the only good things from that
Exposition were Louis Sullivan's Transportation Building and the exhibit from
Japan.
The long Transportation Building, ornamented on the outside with intricate
patterns, featured the Golden Doorway, an entrance consisting of five concentric
arches set within a single grand arch. Wright liked the contrast of the strong hor-
47
izontal line of the building with the semicircles in the entiyway.
The Japanese exhibit was a replica of a wooden temple. It had an ample roof
with upturned eaves. In place of solid walls there were sliding screens that
allowed davlight and fresh air to enter continuously. On display in the temple
was a collection of Japanese seventeenth- and eighteenth-century prints, but
Wright was already familiar with these. His former employer, Silsbee, collected
Oriental art.
After the Winslow house, Wright designed an English Tudor half-timbered
house for Nathan Moore because Moore said, "he didn't want anything like that
Winslow house so that he would have to go around back wavs to the train to
avoid being laughed at. ... \\ right took the job because he needed the money to
support his family \et he continued to search for a more personalized architec-
ture. "Ideas had naturally begun to come to me." he wrote, "as to a more natural
house. Each house I buik I longed for the chance to build another."
His next commission, however, was for a windmill. In 189", his aunts asked
him to build a new water tower for the Hillside Home School m Wisconsin.
W right's unusual design was his first blending of architecture and engineering.
He invented his taproot principle and rooted the tower like a tree so it wouldn't
fall. It was anchored deep in a stone foundation and secured with metal straps.
Wright called his structure "Romeo and Juliet because the interlocking forms
suggest the Shakespearean lovers. "Romeo, he said, "will do all the work and
Juliet cuddle alongside to support and exalt him."
Around this time Wright s friend Cecil gave up architecture and left Chicago.
Wright moved his practice to the Steinwav Hall, where other bright young
architects had their offices, and in 1898 he built the studio next to his house.
Wright was so busy that his children didn t see much of him except at mealtime.
Sometimes thev sneaked out to the balcony overlooking the drafting room and
48
Although Wright denied any direct infllence from Japanese
architectl re, the slightly lptlrned eaves (edges of the roof)
OF THE Dana Holse resemble those of the pagodas in the
Japanese prints that Wright studied.
peeked at him going over plans with a client. Or thev "cjuietlv" threw things
down on the heads of the draftsmen.
As Wright's practice grew, he hired more men and women to assist him. They
adored him and dressed the way he did, with flowing ties and smocks. Some of
them had been associated with Wright at Steinway Hall. Wright and his con-
temporaries were developing a new kind of house design and the movement was
called the Prairie School. It echoed the spirit and look of the American Midwest.
The emphasis was on simplicity and a respect for materials. With the help of his
staff during the next decade, Wright built at least eightyone Prairie Houses and
49
planned fortynine more. Some were as far away as Buffalo, New York, and
Montecito, California. Then how could they be called Prairie Houses?
All of them expressed shelter, security, and privacy with their horizontal lines,
low-spreading roofs, and concealed
entrances. For every house, Wright
used local materials and used the mate-
rials naturally. Brick looked like brick,
wood showed its color and grain. He
related each house to its natural setting
as if It had grown out of the ground.
On the prairie, Wright designed
houses low and parallel to the earth.
He coined the word "streamlined' to
describe this characteristic. He did
away with high stuffy attics and damp
cellars. W^right wanted to reduce the
number of parts of a house to a mini-
mum. He thought of the house as essen-
tially one free-flowmg space centered
around a fireplace. There were no
walled partitions except for private
areas, such as bedrooms, kitchens, and
bathrooms. Indoor plumbing had just
come in, around 1890, along with elec-
tricity and steam heat.
Wright dramatically lowered and sloped ceilings to make rooms easier to heat,
cool, and light and to create intimacy. The typical ceiling in a Victorian house
was eleven or twelve feet high. W^nght brought the scale down to fit a human
1
1Sf^*''nSSM^"""^" II
W^ ^^^'^^:1
a»=rife^
^^r^^\. ;W/f^1^1^M^^y^.A^Ar*.;..i|i.k|f^aiii^Miii
1
MM.
1^
4
1
1
1
1 mt '?
^3i III i.
.**^^ 1* 110^'*
f**^^ i». -.JC
i
1
1
1
1
1,1
^s
The sumac window in the
D.4NA House allows light
TO come in, but the
COLORFUL PATTERN ALSO
SERVES AS A SCREEN TO
ENSURE PRIVACY.
50
being— himself. "It has been said," he wrote, 'that were I three inches taller than
5'8'/2', all mv houses would have been c]uite different in proportion." He also
lowered and enlarged windows to connect the indoors with the outdoors.
Some of the Prairie Houses were small, such as Wright's drawing of a model
house, A Home in a Prairic Town, published in the Ladies' Home journal in February
1901. In July, the magazine published a second drawing called A Small House wiih
Lots of Room in It.
Other Prairie Houses were large. One of the most elaborate is the Dana House
in Springfield, Illinois, with thirty-five rooms. Susan Lawrence Dana was a
wealthy widow who hired Wright to design a mansion suitable for entertaining
lavishly. She gave Wright unlimited funds and the opportunity to show off his
skills.
Planning and construction of the Dana House began in 1902, and the magnifi-
cent house was completed in 1904. It rises gracefully from a corner city lot. The
arched brick entryway is reminiscent of the Golden Doorway in Sullivan's
Transportation Building. Architectural historians say this dramatic entrance sug-
gests the opening of a cave.
Wright used thin, narrow buff-colored Roman bricks on the inside of the house
as well as on the outside. Using the same material inside and out had never been
done before. A stairway leads from the vestibule to a main hall, two stories high.
Both the dining room and the studio gallery are barrel-vaulted like the playroom
Wright created for his children. The main theme of the exquisite art glass doors
and windows is the sumac, one of Wright's favorite shrubs that grows on the
prairie. He created hundreds of geometric interpretations of the sumac. The
prairie also gave Wright the colors for the house. On the train ride between
Chicago and Springfield, he saw the soft green, mauve, gold, and rich russet-
brown he used for the interior.
The same year the Dana House was completed, Wright designed a compact
51
one'storv house in Oak Park for
Edwin and Mamah Borthwick
Cheney. The house was particu-
larly significant because it sparked
a relationship between Wright
and Mrs. Cheney. She was a love-
ly, intelligent woman. Even
though they were both already
married, thev felt attracted to
each other.
Meanwhile, Wright kept busy.
Although he was mainly consid-
ered a residential architect, he
designed two public buildings
during his Oak Park period that
became landmarks: the Larkin
Company Administration Building m Buffalo, New York, in 1904, and Unity
Temple in Oak Park, Illinois, m 1905.
Since the site of the Larkin Building was located m a factorv district near a rail-
road yard, Wright shut out the noise and dirt and focused on the interior. He cre-
ated a simple, geometric brick building and pushed the staircases out to the four
corners to form an open central courtyard mside. Natural light poured in through
a skylight and in from bands of high windows on everv floor or gallery. The top
story had a restaurant and a conservatory with flowers and plants.
Eighteen hundred people worked together in open spaces on the main floor and
on the upper galleries as they handled mail orders for Larkin soap. The top exec-
utives sat in the verv center of the main floor, an unusual arrangement that gave
them no privacv or status. But thev were progressive. The Larkin Building was
52
the first air-conditioned office building in America. Wright cleaned and cooled
the air by using a combination of an air-purifying and cooling apparatus with a
refrigeration machine.
The Larkin Building was also one of the first fireproofed buildings. Wright
accomplished this by using a steel frame and bricks inside and out. He also
designed for the building metal office furniture—another first—as an additional
fireproofing measure. "I was a real Leonardo da Vinci when I built that building,
"
Wright said. "Everything in it was my invention." As usual Wright favored art
over comfort. A three-legged office chair he designed was so shaky that employ-
ees named it the "suicide chair." But Wright's favorite invention was the wall-
hung toilet (designed to make mopping easier) and, along with it, the ceiling-
hung stall partition.
Many European architects visited the Larkin Building and were greatly influ-
(Opposite) A VIEW OF THE
INTERIOR OF THE LARKIN
Building from the balcony
ACROSS THE COURTYARD. THE
balconies were inscribed with
inspiring words: enthusiasm.
Intelligence. Cooperation.
Action. Wright considered this
ONE of his most IMPORTANT
buildings.
( Left J Wright designed steel
ARMCHAIRS WITH L E AT H E R - C O V F R E
D
SEATS FOR THE LaRKIN BUILDING.
53
The massive geometric shapes of Umty Temple bear a resemblance
TO A structure MADE WITH FrOEBEL'S WOODEN BLOCKS.
54
amazingly bright and intimate.
Light pours in through
skylights and high bands of
WINDOWS. When members of the
CONGREGATION EXIT, THEY VI A L K
TOWARD THE PULPIT RATHER
THAN AWAY FROM IT.
enced by Wright's design, a total integration of form and function. Ludwig Mies
van der Rohe, a German-born architect, said, "Certainly I was very much
impressed . . . by the office building in Buffalo. Who wouldn t be impressed?'
Mies Van der Rohe's spare Lake Shore Drive apartment houses in Chicago bear a
distinct resemblance to Wright s Larkin Building, and his Bacardi Office Building
in Mexico features a large open
room as a work space. The intehior of IMty Temple is
However, one critic who
favored a more classical style
thought the Larkin Building
was "extremely ugly."
Nevertheless, more commis-
sions poured into Wright's
office. In February 1905, he
took a break from his exhausting
schedule and went on a vacation
with friends who were also
clients. Perhaps they knew
about Wright's interest in Mrs.
Chenev and wanted to distract
him. At any rate, they invited
Wright and his wife, Kitty, to go to Japan with them.
When Wright sailed into Yokohama Bay he was thrilled to discover that Japan
looked "just like the prints" in his collection. During the trip Wright bought
more prints and other pieces of art. The Japanese print reinforced the lesson of
simplicity—
'the elimination of the insignificant. He marveled at Japanese
houses. "At last I had found one country on earth where simplicity, as natural,
IS supreme, " he said.
55
Refreshed and inspired, Wright returned to Oak
Park to receive an important commission. In June 1905,
the old Unitarian Church burned down and a commit-
tee hired Wright to build a new one. They wanted a
traditional New England church complete with a
steeple. But Wright's idea was to create "a modern
meeting-house and good-time place ... a nobly simple
room, " scaled down to human proportions. "A natural
building for natural Man."
With a budget of $45,000, Wright had to do some-
thing "cheap and direct. " He chose concrete as a build-
ing material. The forms used to cast concrete were made
of wood, so another way to cut costs was to cast one
half then reuse the mold for the other side that was
essentially identical. Thus he arrived at the cube, the 32
motif for Unity Temple.
For weeks Wright developed the drawings and
plans until he was ready to make a presentation to the
committee. As soon as he received approval he pro-
ceeded to make a plaster model; he was then given a go-
ahead and construction began. The powerful building
with Its massive shapes, piers, and roof slab looks like
an abstract design made with Froebel blocks, the
building toy Wright's mother had given him when he
was a child. All the elements of Unity Temple are formed by straight lines.
Wright demonstrated his genius by using squares and cubes over and over again
without becoming monotonous. The interior space of the building defined its
outer shape. Unity Temple was completed in 1907 and Wright was pleased.
56
The living room of the Cooinley Hoi se. Wri(;ht repeated
THE geometric DESIGN TO CREATE AN INTERIOR THAT WAS Ql lET,
UNCLUTTERED, AND COMFORTABLE.
57
"I knew I had the beginning of a great thing," he said, "a great truth in archi-
tecture."
Around this time Avery and Queene Coonlev asked him to build a house for
them and Wright considered it one of his most successful of this period. The large
house is spread out over a spacious site. Wright planned it in wings or zones: the
bedrooms m one ^ving, the living room m another, and so on. Once again he was
I fli^lHHB^^H allowed to design everv
The presentation ink drawing
of the robie holse. piblished in the
Wasmith Portfolio, illustrates its
LONG, LOW LINES. MaNY CONSIDER IT THE
^^^^^^ ULTIMATE Prairie House.
detail—from the furni-
ture, carpets, drapes,
lamps, and exterior ceram-
ic tile, down to table
linens. It is said that he
even designed dresses for
Queene Coonlev so that
she would harmonize with
her rooms. The estate
with Its lovelv reflecting
pool was one of Wright's
most complete creations.
^.- ^ — Each part related to the
whole and repeated the same geometric motif.
Wright's last great Prairie House, and perhaps the most dramatic of all, was
the Robie House. The long, low red brick house was built in Chicago between
1907 and 1909. Locals nicknamed it "The Battleship. " When Frederick Robie,
a bicvcle manufacturer, came to Wright, he knew exactlv what he wanted. "I
wanted rooms without interruptions, he said. "I wanted the windows without
curvature and doodads inside and out."
Wright gave Robie exactlv what he wanted—an astounding work of art. He
58
designed all the furniture "as a natural part of the building '
I he chairs grouped
around the dining table form a room within a room, an idea he had used in his
house at Oak Park But even Wright admitted his chairs v\eren t comfortable.
Once he remarked, "I have been black and blue in some spot, somewhere, almost
all mv life from too much intimate contact with mv own earlv furniture. " The
total cost of the Robie House, including the custom-made furnishings, came in at
$59,000, a thousand under budget. In those days, the average middle-class house
cost about $5,000 to build. Robie was willing to spend much more and was
delighted with his new home.
At forty-two, Wright was a success. He had built more than one hundred and
fifty structures but he still didn t have the recognition and acceptance he craved.
Many Americans regarded his buildings as odd and too unusual When he
received an invitation from the firm of Ernst Wasmuth in Berlin to publish a com-
plete monograph of his work, Wright w as tempted to leave Oak Park and go to
Germany where his modern ideas would be appreciated. Despite his success,
debts plagued him and he was always short of cash. Clients often didn't pay their
bills on time and Wright had a big family to support and salaries to pay. After
working hard for so many years, he was burned out.
In his autobiography he wrote, "I was losing my grip on my work and even my
interest in it. . . . What I wanted I did not know I loved my children. I loved
my home. A true home is the finest ideal of man, and yet—well, to gain freedom
I asked for a divorce."
Kittv refused. She loved her husband dearly and hoped he would change his
mind. But Wright's attachment to Mamah Cheney had grown too strong.
In the fall of 1 909 Wright sold many of his Japanese prints to raise money and
took a train to New York. There he rendezvoused with Mamah and they sailed
for Europe. Wright left behind his wife, children, mother, a flourishing practice
of architecture, and a $900 grocer's bill.
59
Wright had devoted his life to architecture. Now at age forty-
two he had no home of his own, no clients, no buildings to build. He and
Mamah traveled from Germany to Italy, and Wright turned to writing and
making a book. The stunning Wasmuth Portfolio, published in 1910, showed
drawings and floor plans of all of his work. Architecture students in
UAD
Europe used it as a textbook.
Back in the United States, Wright's wife, Kitty, also made a book. She
still loved her husband and while he was gone she put together Daily
Reminders. Each page marked a day of that difficult year with a poem,
photo, or magazine illustration. Kitty saved the book for her husband in
60
In desicmnc these windows for the Coonley Playhoise,
Wright was inspired by a parade on a national holiday. After
the parade he broight a b l > c h of gas- fill ed balloons to his
office and studied the way they bobbed ip and do«n.
(Following page) TxLlESiy HoiSE IS REFLECTED IN THE POND.
This place has been described as one of the most bfai tifi i.
spots on earth. here wright created a perfect iivkmon^
of landscape and architectikf— \ natiral h o i s e
.
61
the hope that he would eventually return to her.
Wright did return to Chicago. He remodeled his studio in Oak Park as living
quarters for Kitty and the children, though he took his own apartment down-
town. Many people disapproved of Wrights behav^ior as a familv man and
snubbed him. Even his few loval friends criticized him. One of them commented
that W^right now looked like the man on the Quaker Oats package with his "knee
trousers, long stockings, broad'brimmed brown hat, and lordlv strut."
W^right needed a refuge, and his mother came to the rescue. She bought some
land near the familv farm m Spring Green, W^isconsin, and gave it to Wright.
There he designed a home where he and Mamah Chenev could begin a new life
—
the ultimate natural house, blending landscape and architecture. Wright planned
the estate as a working farm as well as a home, office, and studio-workshop. He
wanted to grow his own fruits and vegetables and raise livestock. With charac-
teristic humor he named the pigpen area Pork Avenue.
62
Wright called the entire estate Taliesin (Tal/ee/essen), which means "shining
brow" in Welsh. Indeed, the house runs along the hillside like the ridge of a
brow on a forehead. When he was a bov, this site had been one of his favorite
places to gather v\ ildllowers "It was unthinkable to me,' he wrote, "at least
unbearable, that any house should be put on that beloved hill I knew well that
no house should ever be on a hill or on anything. It should be o\ the hill . . . belong
to the hill, as trees and the ledges or rock did."
Wright built with local materials—sand from the banks of the Wisconsin
River for mixing plaster and limestone quarried a mile away for building walls.
He instructed the masons to set the stones in overlapping ledges, the way they
form naturally in the quarry.
Stone steps led to flower gardens and courtyards. Each court contained a foun-
tain and piece of Oriental art. More sculptures, urns, and screens decorated the
rooms inside, warmed in winter by rugged stone fireplaces. Wright planned the
house so that the sun came through the windows into every room at some time
during the day. Corner windows, called mitered windows, were sealed with a
clear adhesive and provided uninterrupted views of the treetops and pond.
Casement windows, Wright s favorite, swung open to let in "the perfume of the
blossoms and the songs of the birds. During the winter months, icicles hung from
the eaves, transforming Taliesin into a "frosted palace."
Wright and Mamah Cheney moved in just before Christmas 191 1 and lived
there for three years. Her children visited every summer. Edwin Cheney had
agreed to a divorce, but Kitty still refused to give one to Wright. Some of
Wright's children missed their father, others felt angry.
Wright missed his family, too. Whenever he went to his Chicago office he vis-
ited Oak Park. He would go to his house after dark and stand outside, listening
to his children's voices through the half-open windows, reassuring himself that
they were all right.
63
Throughout these years Wright lost most of his old clients. A few faithful
friends gave him work. The Coonleys, for instance, asked him to build a school
in Riverside, Illinois. It was called a Playhouse because the children learned his-
tory by writing and performing plays about historical events. For this, Wright
designed a stage and art glass windows with balloons, flags, and confetti.
Since most people lost faith in him as a family man and no longer trusted him
to design their homes, Wright looked for different kinds of challenging projects.
He heard about a commission for designing a new Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, Japan,
and was eager to land the job. Friends helped him make contacts and, in 1913,
he and Mamah traveled to Tokyo. Wright drew rough sketches and preliminary
plans and started discussing arrangements with the hotel company. He then went
back to Taliesm and made more drawings and models for the new hotel.
This project was temporarily interrupted by another stimulating challenge. Ed
Waller, the son of one of Wright's first clients, asked Wright to create an
indoor/outdoor entertainment center for dinner, dancing, and concerts on the
south side of Chicago. It was called Midway Gardens. One weekend, Wright
visualized the entire project before ever setting a pencil to paper. "The thing had
simply shaken itself out of my sleeve," he wrote m his autobiography. Wright
designed everything—from the tables, chairs, and chinaware down to decorative
sculptures and murals. Assisted by his son John, W^right commuted between
Chicago and Spring Green while Midway Gardens was under construction.
One day while supervising a mural that John was painting, Wright received a
phone call. The news was terrible. Taliesin was on fire. He and John dashed to
the station and took the first train to Spring Green. Reporters were on board. So
was Edwin Cheney. Along the way reporters told them horrible news.
A new chef and handyman had gone mad and set fire to the house, then barred
the doors and brutallv murdered Mamah and her children. As the other lunch
guests tried to escape and jump out the windows, he attacked them, too. Four
64
more people later died of wounds and burns John said he never forgot the look of
anguish on his father's face as he learned the ghastly details. Wright and Cheney
silently clasped hands in mutual grief and despair.
Chenev took the bodies of his children home The other victims were buried
bv their families. At Taliesin, Wright had a plain casket made for Mamah. He
filled it with flowers cut from her garden and buried her himself
Wright missed Mamah dreadfully and lost weight at first He may even have
begun to change his birth date at this point and borrowed hers, 1869, as a way
of remembering her. Only work comforted him. He busied himself with the task
of rebuilding Taliesin and continued with the Imperial Hotel project.
Fraink Lloyd Wright lived and v^orkkd with his apprentices
AT Taliesin. There were no formal lecti res or classes, Yoi no
sTi dents learned by participating in his projects.
65
Wright wanted the Imperial Hotel to blend in with its
SURROUNDINGS. HE USED LOCAL MATERIALS SUCH AS OYA AND LAVA
STONE IN CONSTRUCTION.
Meanwhile, World War I broke out. Wright was a pacifist like his Unitarian
relatives and opposed the war. He spent the war years preoccupied with work.
Shortly after the tragedy at Taliesin, W^right received a sympathetic letter
from someone he had never met. Her name was Miriam Noel. She was a sophis-
ticated, stylish divorcee who had lived in Pans and fancied herself a sculptress.
W^right was charmed by her note and arranged to meet her. Soon they were
romantically involved and he moved her to Taliesin, along with his mother. In
1916, after he was officially hired as the architect of the new Imperial Hotel, he
sailed to Japan with Miriam and began construction.
The hotel was to be a comfortable place where foreigners could stay. Wright
wanted to give Japan the best of Western technology, while still respecting its
66
traditions. His biggest concern, however, was earthquakes.
In Tokyo, Wright tested his theories about earthcjuakeproof foundations.
"Why fight the quake?" he asked. "Whv not sympathize with it and outwit it''"
After collecting data and making calculations with his son, John, and Paul
Mueller, a builder who had worked on Midway Gardens, he came up with an
idea. He would "float the hotel foundation on the mud beneath the ground sur-
face, using the cantilever principle. The weight of the floor and roof would be
supported in the center, balanced the way "a waiter carries a tray on his upraised
arm and fingers." He planned a large pool in the entrance court to serve both as
an architectural feature and as an independent water supply in case of fire. He
remembered onlv too well the fire at Taliesin.
As work progressed on the hotel, rumors spread that Wright was crazy. In the
event of an earthquake, the new building would collapse and sink into the mud.
He Ignored the rumors and forged ahead with designs for furniture, upholstery,
rugs, and dinnerware. The work was very hard and went on for six years.
An added difficulty was W^right's personal life. His relationship with Miriam
Noel soured. She was a moody woman, addicted to alcohol and drugs and given
to "frequent outbreaks." The stress this created for Wright, in addition to the
hardships of building the hotel, made him physically ill. So his mother, now in
her eighties, sailed to Japan to take care of him.
One of the construction problems he was struggling with concerned the court-
yard pool. The building committee wanted to save money by eliminating it.
Wright argued that the water would be necessary if the city water supply was
cut off after a quake. As if on cue—an earthquake struck! Chimneys fell off the
old Imperial Hotel, but the new one was undamaged. "The work had been
proved," Wright said, and the committee agreed to put in the pool
A year later, in 1923, while in Los Angeles, he heard that Japan had been hit
by a terrible earthquake. The Kanto earthquake was the worst natural disaster in
61
recorded history at that time. According to the first reports, Tokyo had been
wiped out. Wright received a call informing him that the Imperial Hotel was
totally destroyed. But he didn t belieye it. A week later he received a telegram
from a friend and representative of the Imperial household. It read:
FOLLOWING WIRELESS RECEIVED TODAY FROM TOKYO. HOTEL STANDS
UND.AMAGED AS MONUMENT TO YOUR GENIUS HUNDREDS OF HOMELESS
PROVIDED BY PERFECTLY NL-\INTAINED SER\ICE CONGRATULATIONS.
As letters arrived, W right was relieved to hear that nearly all his friends were
safe. In a gratifying postscript, he learned that after the quake, when fire swept
across the citv. hotel bovs formed a bucket brigade at the courtyard pool—the
only water supply available anywhere. That was what saved the Imperial Hotel
from burning down.
During these vears, Wright traveled back and forth across the Pacific. In
California, he worked with some new clients. Alme Barnsdall was an oil heiress
who was passionately interested m the theater. She wanted W right to create a
colony for her on Olive Hill m Los .Angeles that would include theaters, resr
dences for actors, shops, and her own home. Only her house was built.
Barnsdall named it Hollyhock House after her favorite flower and it has been
compared to a fortress or Mavan temple. Wright transformed the hollyhock into
an abstract geometric motif and integrated it into the structure of the concrete
columns, piers, art glass doors and windows, and wooden dining chairs.
He used a different building technique for Alice Millard, another client, from
Highland Park, Illinois. Now Millard wanted something in Pasadena, California,
appropriate for the landscape, climate, and her collection of antique books. La
Mmiatura, the house Wright built for her in 1923, was his first entirely concrete
68
block house. Since he sited it in a ravine filled with eucalyptus, he gave the
blocks a surface pattern that blended with the trees.
Wright had been experimenting with the concrete block as a building materi-
al. "It was the cheapest (and ugliest) thing in the building world," he wrote.
"Why not see what could be done with that gutter rat?" With his oldest son,
Lloyd, also an architect, he invented a new system. He used hollow, precast con-
crete blocks that were plain, perforated, or patterned and strung them through
with steel rods, then filled them where necessary with poured concrete. Wright
thought of the process as weaving and considered the resulting wall surface a kind
of textile. Therefore, he called his new system "textile block construction."
Between 1923 and 192/)., Wright built three more block-system houses in the
Hollywood Hills for John Storer, Charles Ennis, and Samuel Freeman.
The Storer House is two stories high and features exciting split-levels inside.
The living room is on the upper level and opens onto terraces. The Ennis House
is the largest and most monumental. A long colonnaded gallery leads from the
dining room to three small bedrooms. From the gallery, steps lead up to the din-
ing room, half a level above the living room. Here again, Wright played with
split-levels. In the Freeman House, floor-to-ceiling windows in the upper-level
living room offer breathtaking views of Hollywood below. Perforated blocks
allow natural light to come through and lowered ceilings near the central fire-
place create intimate seating areas.
Despite the many good points of the textile block houses, they proved to be
impractical. They were difficult and expensive to build. The blocks took too long
to make and set in place. They crumbled easily and absorbed rainwater and smog.
Since the Californians didn't want any more of them, Wright returned to Taliesin.
As in California, there were no more commissions for Wright in the Midwest.
Young Chicago architects rejected the Prairie House after World War I and went
"Classic." So Wright took up writing and published technical articles about con-
69
structing the Imperial Hotel. It is said that
he spent his entire earnings from the hotel
project on buvmg more Japanese art for his
extensive collection.
At age fiftv'seven. more than a decade
after he had left Oak Park. Wright once
again had few clients, little cash, and big
debts. Although he had a home, it seemed
emptv. His first \vife. Kittv, finallv divorced
him in 1922. Then his mother died m
Februarv 1923. Shortlv after. Wright mar-
ried Miriam Noel to stabilize their relation-
ship, but a few months later she left him. He
wrote to his son Llovd: "I don t kno\v where
to turn at present but I know I've got to
work. . . . That s all I ever reallv kno\v."
Floor-to-ceiling windows and
GL.\SS DOORS in THE FREEM.\N
House look ovt toward
Hollywood. California. S a m i e l
Freeman said. "When the holse
WAS finished enolgh so we
CO LED MOVE IN. WE DID NOT HAVE
A STICK OF F I R N I T I R E . W E SAT
ON BOXES. AND THE HOLSE
NEVER SEEMED BARE.**
70
.m^l "Wi
71
Wright chose the spiral ramp for the Giggenheim Miselm becalse
HE FELT visitors COULD VIEW ART MORE COMFORTABLY WALKING ALONG
AN AIRY OPEN SPACE, RATHER THAN THROIGH STl FFY GALLERIES.
72
APfiOIIIS[In November, 1924, Wrighi met a beautiful young woman
named Olgivanna Hinzenberg, and his life changed. By the first of the new
year they were living together at Taliesin. He was fiftyseven, and she was
twenty-six.
Olgivanna had been married before and had a daughter who stayed
PU.D
With her and Wright. In the spring Olgivanna became pregnant and
Wright was delighted. The future looked wonderful until a fire broke out
in a bedroom at Taliesin one evening. W^right organized a bucket brigade
but high winds fanned the flames and the fire spread beneath the roof.
Wright climbed to "the smoking roofs . . . and fought" to save the work'
K[PI
73
rooms. A sudden rainstorm put out the fire just as it reached the studio-
workshop, but the living quarters and Wright's collection of Oriental art objects
were destroyed. Wright was then again pinched for money. "My Tokyo earnings
all went up in smoke," he said. "All I
could show for mv work and wander-
ings in the Orient for years past were
the leather trousers, burned socks, and
shirt m which I now stood defeated."
However, Wright still had many of
his prints safely stored m the vault. He
had a good eye and had collected hun-
dreds of museum-quality wood-block
prints by Japanese masters. He even
owned and saved ten original wood-
blocks of the artist Ando Hiroshige and
was one of three people outside of
Japan known to have them. Yet Wright
couldn't sell the art for what it was
worth because the market had declined
and values dropped.
So Wright borrowed money from
the bank and from friends, using his
print collection as collateral, and he optimistically drew plans for Taliesin III. In
July he filed for divorce from Miriam Noel and then his real troubles began. She
sued him for money and property and hounded him for years. After Olgivanna
gave birth to a daughter in December 1925, Wright went into hiding upon
advice from his lawyer, and his new "little family" stayed on the move.
The following October, Miriam went so far as to have Wright arrested for
Mrs. Frank Lloyd Wright
IN THE L0GGI.4, 1936. Like
THE Buddha on the wall,
Olgivanna serenely
graces Taliesin.
74
transporting Olgivanna, an unmarried woman, across state lines Wright spent
two miserable nights in jail but took advantage of the opportunity to size up the
terrible architecture. He appeared in countv and municipal courts and posted
bonds to get out of jail. Sensational publicity kept clients awav and prevented
him from doing the one thing he wanted to do— work.
The worst moment came
This i>k\«i%g gives a night
VIEW OF THE Twin Caintileveked
Bridges Project for Pittsbikgh.
Here Wright showed what coi id
be done with steel. " t h e steel
strand is a marvel," he said,
"a miracle OF STRENGTH FOR
ITS WEIGHT AND COST."
when the bank threatened to
take Taliesin awav from him.
Finally a settlement was made
with the bank and Wright
went home with his familv.
After his divorce from Miriam
became final in 1928, he mar-
ried Olgivanna. Now he was
ready to go back to work on
projects started during these
difficult years.
In the late 1920s, Wright
did little actual building. The
few commissions he received
were not executed, usuallv for
lack of funds. Yet Wright
believed that his unbuilt projects were his most interesting.
Sugarloaf Mountain in Frederick County, Maryland, was planned as a tourist
attraction, with a planetarium, restaurant, movie theater, and observation decks.
Here Wright designed his first spiral ramp for cars and later used it as a walk-
way in the Guggenheim Museum in New York.
Steel Cathedral was to have been over two thousand feet high, making it the
75
largest church in the world, big enough to seat a million people. The Empire
State BuildintT would have fit inside. Later Wricrht reduced and refined the
tepeelike design for Beth Sholom Synagogue in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania.
Wright was fascinated bv the materials of glass and steel. He called steel "the
most significant material of this age because of its strength, cheapness and tenu-
ity, or quality of pull. "The spiderweb is a good inspiration for steel construc-
tion," Wright said. The steel strands m the drawing Tuui CaMtiltitrt'd Bridges
Proittt for Pitts burg It look like membranes of a spider's web.
Wright expanded this image when discussing the potential of glass. "Why not
The drafting room at Hillside \ias added in 1938.
Wright called it "the abstract forest" because of the
intricate truss work of oak beams.
76
now combine it with steel, the spider's web . . . and make it the building itselP'
Technology had made glass cheap and available as never before, and Wright envi-
sioned modern cities with luminous "glass and bronze buildings
When he stayed in New "^ork, Wright had a chance to observe urban prob
lems of overcrowding, traffic, and pollution. In a project for the pastor of St.
Mark s'ln-the'Bouwerie, in New York, he designed three apartment towers with
outer walls of glass set into copper frames. To make the towers secure, Wright
proposed the taproot principle of construction he had used in building the Romeo
and Juliet windmill. Later on he used the design to build his New York sky-
scraper as the tower for H. C. Price Company in Bartlesville, Oklahoma
Then, in 192"], Wright discovered the desert. He was asked to design a large
resort, the San-Marcos-in-the-Desert in Chandler, Arizona, and fell in love with
the site. He studied the tall saguaro cactus for inspiration and excitedlv began
making sketches.
While working on the project, Wright built his first campsite—Ocatillo,
named for another plant. Just as he was about to start construction on the hotel
in 1929, the stock market crashed. The client had no money to complete the proj-
ect, so Wright left Arizona and drove back to Wisconsin.
During the Depression years when Wright had no commissions, he did more
writing and lecturing. An Autobiograpliv was published in 1932 Manv aspiring
architects read it and wrote to him asking if thev could stud\ with him
In the fall of that same year, Wright opened a School of the Allied Arts, called
the Fellowship, on the old Hillside Home School property his aunts had left him
when they died. He followed their educational tradition of learning by doing.
For $650 tuition, young people studied music, dancing, weaving, and, of
course, architecture, and also spent a certain number of hours ever\ day farming,
taking care of the livestock, cooking, repairing roads, and constructing buildings.
In the drafting room the apprentices assisted Wright with his projects and
77
worked on their own designs.
Critics said Wright formed the school to support his practice, grow his food,
and run his estate. Yet applicants kept coming and had to be turned awav or go
on a waiting list, even when tuition was raised to $1,100. Wright worked
alongside his "boys and girls" as they built living quarters, a new drafting room,
and a playhouse.
At the playhouse, Wright showed foreign films to the public every Sunday for
an admission price of fifty cents, which included tea afterward. Wright loved
movies, especially Westerns and Charlie Chaplin comedies. In later years, the
routine changed and the entire Fellowship saw movies on Saturday nights and
went on picnics on Sundays.
In those days Wright sported a cape (to make him look taller), shoes with
elevated heels, tweed trousers fastened at the ankles with cloth ties (to keep
out drafts), and a beret, porkpie hat, or sombrero. When out driving he wore an
aviator's cap.
Wright adored cars and every model he had was painted Cherokee red. With
his extraordinary vision he foresaw^ the increase of cars and highways in America
and wanted to make gas stations attractive as well as functional.
In 1932, he designed a service station with overhead fuel lines, a second-floor
waiting room, and a cantilevered canopy extending out from the walls. The
design was adapted and finallv built in 1956 bv R. W. Lmdholm in Cloquet,
Minnesota. The townspeople were so proud of the onlv Frank Llovd Wright-
designed service station in America that when they thought it would be torn
down to make room for a new highway, they had the highway built around it.
The Standardized Overhead Service Station was originally intended as part of
Broadacre City, a scale model of an ideal community that Wright planned with
his apprentices. The model was first exhibited in New York and then traveled
throughout the United States.
78
Edgar |. Kaufmann, the father of one of the apprentices, financed the traveling
exhibit. In 1935, he asked Wright to design a weekend house for him on wood-
ed family land in Bear Run, Pennsylvania Kaufmann wanted to have a view of a
waterfall on the property. Wright had a different idea. When they looked over
the land together to choose a building site, Wright said, "E.J.,
where do you
like to sit?" Kaufmann pointed to a big rock overlooking the waterfall—and
Wright made that spot the hearthstone of the house. He wanted his client to live
over the waterfall, not just look at it.
The day Kaufmann came to Taliesin to see the first plans for the house, there
weren t any. To the amazement of the apprentices standing by, Wright made the
first drawings with colored pencils in a couple of hours while Kaufmann was en
route. "The design just poured out of him," Edgar Tafel recalled. The drawings
F.ALLINCU ATER IS A TRILY N'ATl RAI. H O T S E , WRIGHT SAID,
"YOL LISTEN TO FALLINGWATER THE WAY YOl LISTEN TO THE
Ql lET OF THE COINTRY."
79
>ll>--*
Pictured here in the wintertime is Fallingwater.
In any season the house seems to buend with the surrounding
woods and cuiffs.
were finished minutes before Kaufmann arrived. After he saw them, Kaufmann
said, "Don't change a thing." And Wright didn t.
Wright named the house Fallingwater. The living room is cantilevered right
over the waterfall like a diving board. Suspended stairs lead from the living room
dov/n to the stream. The whole house is a series of reinforced concrete trays
anchored to a tall stone core. W^right said the house showed how "buildings
grow from their sites." He used stone from a local quarry for the chimney and
floors and tinted the poured concrete a shade of apricot to harmonize with the
surrounding foliage.
80
Fallingwater became one of the most famous private houses of the twentieth
century. The American Institute of Architects (AlA) has designated it as one of
seventeen buildings designed by Wright to be preserved as examples of his con-
tribution to American culture.
In 1936, Wright created another landmark structure, the Johnson Wax
Administration Building in Racine, Wisconsin. The central open work space fea-
tured unusual columns that look like giant mushrooms or lily pads. At first the
Industrial Commission wouldn't give him a permit for the columns. Wright
proved they could stand by having one column poured, propped up, then loaded
with three times its required weight. The props were removed and the column
remained standing. The permit was issued. When the building opened, it was a
sensation.
There was only one problem. W^right had designed his own streamlined steel
furniture, and his three-legged chair tipped like the suicide chair he had invent-
ed for the Larkin Building. Many employees and visitors fell off. When the pres-
ident of the company asked him why he hadn't designed four legs on the chair,
Wright replied, "You won't tip if you sit back and put your two feet on the
ground because then you've got five legs holding you up. If five legs won't hold
you, then I don t know what will!"
Wright didn't limit himself to startling office buildings and impressive coun-
try houses. One of his mam concerns had always been low-cost housing for
middle-income families. In the 1930s, he came up with a concept called the
Usonian House.
Wright coined the word Usonian to mean a reformed American society. Usonian
houses were intended to offer handsome economical dwellings for an informal
way of life without servants. The first one was built in 1936 for Herbert Jacobs,
a newspaper reporter in Madison, Wisconsin. It was 1,500 square feet and cost
$5,500, including the architect's fee.
81
The onc'Storv house introduced fea-
tures found in all of the Usonian homes:
a bedroom zone with small sleeping
spaces: a large living room with a dining
area or table near the kitchen instead of
a formal dining room: builfin furniture,
open shelves, and indirect lighting;
radiant heating (pipe coils laid in the
foundation underneath the concrete
floor): high clerestorv windows running
under the roof overhang: and a carport
at the entrance to replace a garage.
The L soman houses were made with
board and batten construction: that is.
readv-made units that could efficientlv
be put together. Bv using glass, wood,
brick, and stone, both on the inside and
the outside. \\ right eliminated the need
for paint, varnish, wallpaper, and wall
decoration. The houses were easv to
maintain and provided the occupants
Workers >it at metal
DESKS DESIGNED BY WriCHT
FOR THE Johnson Wax
a u m i n i - t k v t h » n b i i l d i n g in
Raline. Wisconsin.
82
83
In the Loren Pope House
(THE POPE-LEIGHY HOISE) LIGHT
comes THROUGH CLERESTORY
WINDOWS DECORATED WITH A
PUNCHED-OUT DESIGN.
With varied spaces and ever-
changing vistas. Loren Pope said of
his house m Falls Church, \'irgmia,
"The house gives vou a sense of
protection, but never of being
closed m."
\\ right designed more than
one hundred of these modest,
modern-looking houses for clients
throughout America. Robert Berger,
a schoolteacher in northern
California, built his home himself
to save monev. After it was fin-
ished, his twelve-vear-old son, Jim,
sent a letter to W right asking him
to design a matching doghouse
for his Labrador retriever, Eddie.
\\ right sketched a design on the
back of an envelope and eventuallv
dre\N" up plans. Jim and his father
built the doghouse, but Eddie
didn't like it and refused to go m it.
Li 1937. after Wright recovered from pneumonia, he bought land in
Scottsdale, Arizona, and moved the whole Fellowship there for the winter
months. It became a permanent second home and was named Taliesin West.
W^right designed the living quarters and workroom in triangular shapes, repeat-
ing the forms of the distant mountains. \\ hite canvas stretched over the redwood
frames. Desert stones and bits of Oriental art were embedded in concrete walls.
84
An art museum was Wright's next major project. In 1943, Solomon
Guggenheim, an industrialist and patron of the arts, asked Wright to design a
museum in New York for his collection of twentieth-century nonobjective art.
Nonobjective art was a movement started by Wassily Kandinsky, who painted
explosive, colorful abstractions that did not depict or represent anything seen in
reality. Wright matched this highly imaginative art with an unusual solution for
the form of the museum.
Wright wanted to design "one great space on a single continuous floor," so he
twisted a long gallery around a central well. The exterior shape of a reinforced
concrete spiral growing larger toward the top expresses the inner space. At the
ground level there is room for an airy entryway, sculpture garden, and parking.
Inside, a magnificent domed skylight and window slits under the ramp provide
natural light for viewing the paintings in their true colors. Walls slope away
Taliesin West emerges naturally from the desert floor.
The triangi lar trisses are made of redwood.
85
An exterior view of the Guggenheim Museum in New York.
Wright said, "The eye encounters no abrupt changes, but is
gently led and treated as if at the edge of the
shore watching an unfolding wave."
86
from the floors at approximately the angle at which a canvas tilts on an easel.
TwentV'one artists objected at first to having their work shown on walls slant-
ed outward. And some viewers found it hard to stand on a slanted ramp and view
the art on tilted walls. But most people enjoved the experience of riding an ele-
vator to the highest level of the ramp, then walking down around an open court,
moving in a single direction in "a cjuiet unbroken wave." Wright saw the ramp as
"space in motion.' He compared
the air-conditioned chambers in
which the paintings would be
shown to "chambers something
like those of the chambered nau-
tilus,' " a spiral seashell in his own
collection.
Wright's daring design sparked
a long series of controversies.
Critics said it looked like a wash-
ing machine on Fifth Avenue. As
planning went on during World
War II, costs of materials and labor
rose, building codes changed, and
construction was delayed. But
Guggenheim loved the plan and
thought It was a masterpiece; he
even set aside money in his will for the museum before he died in 1949.
That same year Wright received a gold medal from the AIA. Although Wright
had never joined the organization because he felt the AIA had overlooked and
neglected him, now he was pleased to finally be recognized by his peers. More
medals, awards, exhibitions of his work, and honorarv degrees soon followed.
A PL.4N AND ELEVATIO.N OK THE
BERCER USOISIAN DOCHOI SE, THE
ONLY DOGHOUSE W R I (; H T EVER
DESIGNED. The TRIANGl I.AR SHAPE
MATCHES THE TRIANGILAR SHAPE
OF THE family's HOISE.
^.\
87
One of the most precious to him was an honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts from the
University of Wisconsin. For vears \\ right had felt embarrassed by his lack of
formal education and he treasured this belated degree.
As honors multiplied, so did commissions. Wright's last vears were his
busiest. In 1956 he was asked to design a television antenna for Chicago that
would be one mile high.
\\ right decided to put
an office building be-
neath the antenna and so
came up with his ulti-
mate skvscraper. Mile
Hiah. Some people
thought the plan was
amusing, others thought
\\ right was crazv, but
he had all the details
worked out—from the
atomic-powered eleva-
tors to parking ramps for
fifteen thousand cars and
the landing decks for
seventy-five helicopters.
From 1948 to 1950,
while he was working on the Guggenheim Museum, he explored spirals and cir-
cular shapes in the \ . C. Morris Shop m San Francisco, California. The shop
originally sold fine glassware and silver. To contrast it with other stores on the
street and to call attention to it, Wright built a plain brick outer wall with an
arched opening similar to the one in the Dana House. The interior of the Morris
Si.NCE D.wiD Wright was in the
CONCRETE MASO.NRY BUSINESS. HE WANTED
TO DEMONSTRATE WHAT COILD BE DONE
WITH THIS BlILDING MATERIAL. ThE
ciRVED Philippine mahogany ceiling in
HIS HOUSE OFFERS A WARM CONTRAST TO
THE CONCRETE BLOCKS.
88
Shop has a ramp spiraling to the second floor and portholes displaying gifts.
Wright continued his experiments with circular shapes when he designed a
house for his son David in Phoenix, Arizona. The cement-block house coils around
a garden and a ramp leads to the front door. Within, curved fireplaces, curved
corridors, and round windows repeat the theme. Wright designed a bold area rug
with a pattern of intersecting circles and curved furniture. The house is near
Taliesin West and Wright frequently dropped by (to the annoyance of David and
his wife), and rearranged furniture. Wright's youngest son, Llewellyn, comment-
ed, "I think he always did indeed feel that any house he had designed still
belonged to him." Wright liked David's house so much that he gave it his special
seal of approval— a square red signature tile reserved for only a few of his build-
ings. He inscribed his initials, FLLW, with a long tail or slash on the W, in the
unbaked clay.
As Wright got older, his ideas grew more imaginative. One of his last proj-
ects, the Broadacre City Project, was a design for transportation of the future
—
an atomic-powered car and a helicopter taxi shaped like a spinning top. Up until
the end, Wright dreamed of an ideal city and an educational system that would
produce citizens who would demand good architecture. "I dreamed at sixteen
of building secure against earthquake— I have done so now, " he said. "1 dreamed
of building tall—I can now build a mile high . . . and I can build houses to fit
people' ... a promise kept, a prophecy fulfilled."
Frank Lloyd Wright died in April 1959, a few months before the Guggenheim
Museum opened, at the age of ninety-one. The museum immediately became a
major New York attraction. Then, from 1989 to 1992, it was closed for renova-
tions and expansion. The new commissioned architects attempted to remain true
to Wright s original vision. Would he have approved?
Once he told his apprentices, "When you are truly creative in your attempt to
design, this thing that we call good design begins and never has an end.'
89
SIBHIliS
Pages 1 and 50: Susan Lawrence Dana House, "sumac
art glass window 1902 Leaded glass. Illinois
Historic Preservation Agencv, Springfield, Illinois.
Photograph: £ 1990 Doug Carr
Pages 2-3: Broadacre Citv Project, "The Li\ing
Cit\'." Perspective drawing showing helicopter taxi
1958 Sepia ink on tracing paper. The Frank Lloyd
W'nght Foundation, Scottsdale. .\rizona (#5825.002).
© The Frank Llovd Wright Foundation
Pages 4-5 and 11: S. C Johnson W ax
Administration Building, interior Detail of glass
timnel coimectmg original Administration Building
with research to%v-er complex 1936 Photograph:
S. C. Johnson Wax
Page ~: Frank Lloyd \\ right in New \ork Citv.
1953. Photograph: Pedro E Guerrero, New Canaan
Page 8: "Mile High Illinois skyscraper project 1956.
Color pencil and gold ink on tracing paper. 24 x 96 .
The Frank Llovd \\ right Foimdation, Scottsdale.
Arizona (#5607.002). © The Frank Lloyd Wright
Foundation
Page 9: \\ ard Willits House, exterior %ne%v. 1901.
Photograph: © 1994 Thomas A. Heinz
Page 10: Taliesin, \new of Imng room 1925
Photograph: Ezra Stoller © Esto (#830-23)
Pages 12-13: Midwav Gardens, perspective drawing
1913. Ink and pencil on tracmg linen, 39 x 16 The
Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale. .Arizona
(#1401.007). © The Frank Llovd Wright Foundation
Page 17: John Storer House, exterior, street side.
1923. Photograph: Julius Shulman, Los Angeles
Page 18: Aima Lloyd Jones and her sisters
Photograph c 1901 , bv Frank Llovd Wright The
State Historical Society of W isconsin, Sonographic
Collections, Madison (WHi X3 44441)
Page 19: William Carev Wright The Frank Lloyd
Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona
(#6301.0001)
Page 20: Wooden blocks from Froebel Gifts The
Frank Llovd Wright Home and Studio Foundation,
Oak Park,' Illinois
Page 21 : Weaving of colored paper from Froebel
Gifts The Frank Lloyd \\ right Foundation,
Scottsdale, Arizona (#1027.028)
Page 22: Frank Llovd Wright. 1876-77. The Frank
Lloyd Wright Foundation. Scottsdale. Arizona
(#6001.0003)
Page 23: U'llJ/Iini drs Reproduced in TIktHous^
Bidutiful. 1897. Photogravure. The Frank Llovd
Wright Foundation. Scottsdale. Arizona
(#7309.001)
Page 24: Weed border drawing. 1896. Ink on art
paper, 15 x 21 . The Frank Llovd WnghtFoundation, Scottsdale, .Arizona (#9609.005).
© The Frank Llovd \\ right Foundation
Page 25: Susan Lawrence Dana House Butterflv art
glass transom (detail). 1902. Leaded glass
Photograph: © 1994 Thomas A. Heinz
Page 29: Frank Llovd Wright The Frank Llovd
\\ right Home and Studio Foundation, Oak Park,
Illinois (H&SH 167)
Page 30: The Hillside Home School. 1887;
demolished 1950 The State Historical Societv of
\\ isconsin. Iconographic Collections. Madison
Page 32: Catherine Tobin W right The Frank Lloyd
\\ right Home and Studio Foundation, Oak Park,
Illinois (H&S H 180)
Page 35: Frank Llovd Wright's house 1889-95. The
Frank Llovd \\ right Home and Studio Foundation,
Oak Park' Illinois (H&S H 1 33B)
Page 39: Frank Llovd Wright s house 1889-1909.
Photograph: Jon Miller Hednch'Blessing, Chicago
Page 40: Frank Lloyd Wright s children The Frank
Llovd Wright Home and Studio Foundation, Oak
Park. Illinois (H&S H 256)
90
Pages 42-43 Frank Lloyd Wright's house 1889-1909
Photograph Jon Miller/HednchBlessing, Chicago
Page 45 Romeo and Juliet Windmill 1896 The
State Historical Society of Wisconsin, Iconographic
Collections, Madison (WHi X3 23632, lot 231 2)
Pages 46-47 Winslow House The Frank Lloyd
Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona
(#9305.01 3). © The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation
Page 49: Susan Lawrence Dana House. 1902. Illinois
Historic Preservation Agency, Springfield, Illinois
Photograph © 1990 Doug Carr
Page 52: Larkin Building, interior, view from balcony
1904-5; demolished 1946 The Frank Lloyd Wright
Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (#0403.0058)
Page 53: Larkin Building, armchair c 1904. Painted
steel with original leather-covered seat, casters, 38 x
24'/! X 21 '. Photograph; © 1994 Thomas A. Heinz
Page 54: Unity Temple 1905-7 Chicago Historical
Societv Photograph: HedrichBlessing, Chicago
Page 55: Unity Temple, interior view. 1905-7.
Photograph: © 1994 Thomas A Heinz
Pages 56-57: The Coonley House, view of the living
room c 1910 The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation,
Scottsdale, Arizona (#0803.023)
Page 58: Frederick C Robie House. Ink drawing
from Wdsmuih Portfolio Chicago, Illinois. The Frank
Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona
(#0908.005). ® Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation
Page 61 Coonley Playhouse windows. 1912. Leaded
clear and cased glass, each 18H x 34'/>6 The Museum
of Modem Art, New York, Joseph H Heil Fund
Page 62 Taliesin House, lake elevation Spring
Green, Wisconsin 1927 Photograph: © 1994Thomas A Heinz
Page 65 Frank Lloyd Wright and apprentices. 1937Chicago Historical Society Photograph. Hedrich-
Blessing, Chicago (HB-44414-H)
Page 66: Imperial Hotel, exterior with pool in fore-
ground 191 5 (demolished) rebuilt Photograph
© 1994 Thomas A Heinz
Pages 70-71 : Samuel Freeman House, interior, view
looking towards Hollywood 1923 Photograph
Julius Shulman, Los Angeles
Page 72 Interior view of the Solomon RGuggenheim Museum Photograph David Heald,
© The Solomon R Guggenheim Foundation, New York
Page 74: Mrs Frank Lloyd Wright. 1936.
Photograph Edmund Teske
Page 75: Night view of Twin Cantilevered Bridges
Project 1948 Tempera on illustration board The
Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona
(#4836.009). ©The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation
Page 76: The Hillside Home School, drafting room.
1938 Photograph: Edmund Teske
Page 79 EdgarJ
Kaufmann House, "Fallingwater,"
perspective drawing 1935 Pencil and color pencil on
tracing paper, 33 x 17 . The Frank Lloyd Wright
Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (#3602.004). ® The
Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation
Page 80: EdgarJ
Kaufmann House, "Fallingwater,"
exterior 1935 Photograph: © i994Thomas A Heinz
Pages 82-83: S C. Johnson Wax Company
Administration Building Photograph S C Johnson
Wax, Racine
Page 84: Loren Pope (PopeLeighy House) 1939
(Relocated to Mount Vernon, Virginia, in 1964.)
Photograph: © 1994 Thomas A Heinz
Page 85: Taliesin West, exterior 1937 Photograph:
© 1994 Thomas A Heinz
Page 86: The Solomon R Guggenheim Museum.
Photograph: © 1994 Thomas A Heinz
Page 87 Mr and Mrs Robert Berger Doghouse.
1950. Pencil on tracing paper The Frank Lloyd
Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona
(#5039 003) © The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation
Page 88 David S Wright House 1950 Photograph:
JSpencer Lake, San Diego
91
Or'-
itt
Italic page numbers refer to
illustrations.
Architectural stvles: Chicago,
36; organic, 1 1 , 24: Prairie,
49-51 ; Queen Anne, 34;
Shingle, 32, 34, 37Arizona, -^-j , 84; 8^
Beth Sholom SNiiagogue, 8. ~6
Broadacre Citv, 89
Cheney, Mamah Borthwick, 52,
59, 63, 64-66
Chicago, 28-29, 36' ^^
Conover, Allan D , i~
Coonlev Plavhouse, 64; 61
Corwin, Cecil, 31, 34-35, 44,
48
Fellowship, The, 22, 77-78, 84:
76
Froebel Gifts, 19, 21, 56; 20, 21
Guggenheim Museum, 8, 75,
85-87, 89; j2, 86
Hillside Home School, 29,
32-33. 48. 77; JO, 75Houid Bdautijul. TKiT, 23; 2^
Houses built by Wright:
Coonlev, 58; 57; Dana, 24,
51 ; 23, ^g, 50; Ennis, 69;
Fallingwater, 10-11, 79, 81;
-p, 80, Freeman, 60; jo-ji;
Hollyhock, 68; Millard, 68;
Moore. 48; Robie, 58, 59; ^8,
Storer, 69; 1 7; WiUits, g,
Winslow, 46-47, ^6,
Wright, Oak Park, 37-41; JJ,
jg, ^2, Wright, David, 89;
88 Sui\so Praine Houses,
Usonian Houses
Imperial Hotel, Tok\o, 64,
66-68, 70; 66
Johnson Wax Building. 10, 11,
81; 11, 82-83
Larkin Building. 52-55, 81 ; 52.
53Lloyd Jones, Enos and James
(uncles), 22; Jane and Nell
(aunts), i8, 32-33, 77; 18,
Jenkin (uncle) , 28, 29, 31, 33
Midvvav Gardens, 12-14, ^4'
12-ij
"Mile High " Illinois skvscraper,
6, 12,88; <^
Moms, V. C- shop, San
Francisco, 88-89; 7
Noel, Miriam (wife), 66, 67, 70,
74-75 -X.
'
Praine Houses, 10, 69
Price, H C, Companv tower.
Romeo and Juliet Windmill, 48,
11 '45
Silsbee, Joseph Lvman, 28, 31,
32. 34-35. 37- 48
Standardized Overhead Service
Station, 78-79
Steel Cathedral, 75-76
Sugarloaf Mountain, 75Sullivan, Louis, 36, 41, 43, 47
Taliesm, Wisconsin, 62-63; ^'^'
61. 62, 65; West, 84-85; <95
Twin Bridges, 76; 75
Unity Temple, 52, 56; j,^, 55Usonian houses, 81-82, 84; 8^,
Wojmutk Portjolio, 60
Wisconsin, 18, 22, 26. 28. 62
World s Columbian Exposition,
47-48Wright, Catharine Tobm (wife),
33-34. 37. 59.60, 62,70; J2Wright, Frank Lloyd: as
apprentice, 27, 31-32, 36; as
architect, 6, 8-13, 14, 15, 50,
59, 68-69; 7' childhood,
16-27; 22, critics of, 15, 59,
87; dress, 27, 49, 62, 78;
education, 22, 26, 27-28; 2g,
in debt, 32, 43, 59, 70, 74; in
Europe, 59-60; honors, 81,
87-88; as innovator, 11,
52-53, 67; in Japan, 55, 64,,_
66-68; love of nature, 9-10,
23, 51; 2J, and oriental art,
.59, 63, 70, 74; personal life,
37, 59, 60, 62, 63-64, 70,
75; as teacher, 77. 84; 65
Wright, Frank Lloyd, children
of: ^atharine. 38, 40-41;
David, 38, 89, Frances, 38,
40; John, 12-14, 3^' 64' 7^'
Llew^llvn, 38, 89; Lloyd, 37,
70; photograph, 40'Wright. Frank Llovd, parents of:
Anna, 16. 19, 21, 26, 33, 34,
37, 62, 67, 70; 18, William
18-19, 2^. 26' ^9
Wright, Frank Lloyd, sisters of:
Maginel, 9, 19, 34: Jennie, 19,
34Wright, Olgivanna (wife),
73-75. 74
92
•̂^/«/.
FIRST IMPRESSIONS
\n[ro^\iCi\ons Xo Art
John James Audubon
Mary Cassatt
Marc Chagall
Edgar Degas
Carl Faberge
Leonardo da Vinci
Paul Gauguin
Francisco Goya
Michelangelo
Claude Monet
Pablo Picasso
Rembrandt
James McNeill Whistler
Andrew Wyeth
Other volumes in preparation
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Susan Goldman Rubin
has written and illustrated books for children
and published novels and mysteries for young
adults. She lives in Los Angeles, where she
also teaches writing.
JACKET FRONT The central atrium of the Guggenheim
Museum in New York City Photo: David Heald ® The
Solomon R Guggenheim Foundation, New York
JACKET BACK: This postcard shows a gasoline station
designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in Cloquet, Minnesota.
Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
loo Fifth Avenue
New York, NY looi i
Printed in Hong Kong
^FIRST IMPRESSIONS
Introductions to Art
FRAIK LLOYD I
was one of the world's greatest
architects. An American, he became
internationally famous for designing some
of the most dramatic buildings of the
twentieth century—homes, churches,
offices, and the great Guggenheim
Museum in New York City.
ISBN D-fllDT-3T7M-b
90000
780810"939745